The arguments about disease eradication programmes, computerised animal tracking systems and delays in implementing national food safety and quality schemes have done nothing to dispel consumer concerns about the commitment of farmers to produce safe, wholesome food, according to the Food Safety Authority chief executive, Dr Patrick Wall.
Despite the obvious delays over who should inspect farms and computerisation of the national herd, the perception that nothing is happening is wrong, he says. "It has dawned on farming organisations that they ignore the consumers at home and abroad at their peril. BSE has rewritten the script."
A system for both registration and inspection to ensure farmers are operating verifiable codes of practice should be the way forward, and would ensure food safety, he told a Guild of Agricultural Journalists meeting at the weekend. Significantly, however, he proposes a two-tier system.
"We require a basic elementary registration scheme - the pass exam - that is compulsory for all farmers to participate in. It would be an expansion of the proposed National Beef Assurance Scheme to become a registration scheme to include beef and dairy cattle, sheep and goats. One couldn't be a farmer without being in the scheme."
To become registered, farmers would have to comply with existing legislation, and practice good husbandry with an emphasis on hygiene, safety and record-keeping. The scheme would be simple and concentrate on safety rather than quality.
The farm advisory body, Teagasc, was best placed to provide mass training to ensure farmers understood what was expected of them. "Farmers need to be reassured this is not designed to cause them grief, rather to help them stay in business."
Inspections, which are the subject of contention at present, could be undertaken on a client fee-paying basis by private vets annually, Dr Wall suggests. Inspections could be audited on a random spot-check basis by suitably-qualified personnel.
On top of the basic scheme, an additional performance-based scheme - "the honours paper" - was necessary for additional requirements, including quality.
"Currently, a plethora of quality and safety assurance schemes exists. It includes those devised by Bord Bia; meat factories, marts and supermarket chains. What we need is one nationally and internationally credible quality assurance scheme, which could be the Bord Bia scheme."
Participation by farms in these performance-related schemes would be entirely voluntary. However, he warns, "they may become a commercial necessity if the multiples (supermarket groups) and purchasers of Irish food abroad require products to be sourced from farms participating in these schemes."
Poultry and pig producers could best be monitored by having a programme focusing on "critical control points" in their production process, backed up by adoption of codes of best practice.
Similarly, those in crop production needed to be subject to a basic elementary scheme with compulsory registration, and an optional performance-based scheme.
Chemical use had to be reduced to an absolute minimum and disease resistance should be as important as high yield when considering which crops to plant. The Food Safety Authority, operating in the consumer's interest, will have the power to establish food safety assurance schemes, either directly or with other agencies. As on-farm activities were under the control of the Department of Agriculture, it - with Teagasc backing - had the expertise to develop these proposed schemes, he believes.
In the long term, a modification of the current REPS (rural environment protection scheme) initiative to include a safety component and adjustment of stocking rates and fertiliser use requirements - to enable larger farmers to come into this scheme - might be the best solution. If necessary, subsidies should be targeted with a view to producing safe food.
Both the basic and performance-related food assurance schemes are implementable within the next 12 months, he insists.
"But this can only happen if we all - the FSA, the Department of Agriculture, farming organisations and professional bodies - work together. If we fail to co-operate, we will all be the losers and a great opportunity for the Irish consumer and `Ireland, the Food Island' will be lost."