He produces organic garlic on a small farm on the Beara peninsula in west Cork. Jim O'Connor is a rare breed; a conventional farmer who abandoned intensive agriculture for the organic way.
O'Connor was reared on a farm in Co Tipperary. His family farmed its way out of recession in the early 1970s; he went on to make a lot of money, though less intensive agriculture with reduced pesticides attracted him, and he incorporated many of its principles into growing potatoes. His outspoken views on "modern" Irish agriculture drew him into the odd row, too. He left farming and opened a bookshop which became "a clearing house for material on organic farming". He always said he would some day embrace organics.
With experience of both camps, Jim O'Connor believes his view may be useful. It is one which excludes genetically modified (GM) foods. Not only are they not in best interests of farmers, he says, they are not in the national interest, as agriculture remains in the throes of acute financial pain with an uncertain future. "We should be looking at alternatives and, perhaps, seeking a way forward in agriculture that is uniquely our own. There is no place for GM foods. The last thing we need is another problem with our foods."
With what he considers to be insufficient evidence to pass GM foods as safe - reflected in the backing last week by 20 prominent scientists of controversial research by Dr Arpad Pusztai which claimed GM foods damage the immune system of rats - Jim O'Connor believes multinational attempts at cornering a world market with such produce are "incredibly audacious".
The questions should not be about whether Irish farmers should go down the green road, he says, but when and how. He can see moves in this direction elsewhere in response to consumer demand for healthy food, which "market forces will eventually satisfy". Denmark is considering a ban on pesticides tied into organic production across its farming sector - with a moratorium on commercial growing of GM crops likely to be part of that new thrust.
Even in Britain, he finds signs of new direction; significant organic food-marketing businesses reporting increases of sales of between 30 and 50 per cent in 1997, and large organic farms making more money than their conventional counterparts. Moreover, in the current climate, he claims that with proper marketing it is possible to secure as good a living from an acre of garlic as from a holding of 500 acres.
Farmers, he suggests, are more informed than most on GM foods, but with their current difficulties the last thing they want is to be dragged into a moral debate about the technology. "In desperate times, it's easier to turn the blind eye."
When the temperature surrounding GM foods in Ireland suddenly rose last year, beet grower Richard Fitzgerald of Loughane near Shanagarry, in Co Cork, decided to be upfront about his decision to allow Monsanto test its controversial GM sugar beet on his land at Ballymaloe. He declared his intentions at a meeting in Midleton of 150 farmers, members of the IFA's Beet and Vegetable Association (BVA). "I said it was a trial. No one objected. The attitude was, let's get on with it. Let's see what the results are."
About 5,000 plants with a gene incorporated into them to withstand Monsanto's own weed-killer Round-Up were planted on a quarter acre plot. The company did the planting and applied the herbicide. The plants' tolerance to Round-Up and the need for fewer sprays was obvious. They thrived, but he could not say if they did better than commercial varieties as he has yet to see detailed results. The Environmental Protection Agency, which granted a licence to Monsanto, supervised much of the work - including destruction of the crop to eliminate any risk of cross-breeding with conventional species.
Is this the way of the future for Irish tillage? "I don't know. I have yet to see the results. I do know there's a lot of public concern. At this point, I want to see the trial continue, to get more information." Vandalising GM test sites does nobody any good, Richard Fitzgerald adds. As the BVA's representative on a world committee of sugar growers, he is aware of the potential of GM varieties; as to their potential in Ireland, he says the technology may prove to be expensive. In the meantime, he says, there is nothing to indicate that farmers and consumers have cause for concern.
