This article is from page 10 of the 2012-11-13 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 10 JPG
THE Department of Agriculture will not be returning any services to its Ennis offices – even on a two-day a week basis. The offices were closed to farmers in April of 2010 with all services for Clare farmers transferred to the department’s offices in Limerick.
Saving on costs was given as the reason for closing the offices, but it emerged before services were cut in Ennis that the Department of Agriculture owned the Ennis offices, while they had to pay rent on the offices in Limerick.
A number of local campaigns to reopen the Ennis branch on a twoday a week basis or to set up a satellite farm advice service as Ennis mart have both been rejected by the Department of Agriculture in recent weeks.
In a letter issued by the department last week, it was confirmed that a part-time office would not be taking place.
“A key reason why this arrangement is necessary is because staff number at the Department [of Agriculture] continue to fall, and in order for the Department’s local office network to provide a fully integrated service to our farm customers and the wider agri-food and rural environmental sectors, our resources need to be concentrated on a regional level,” said Kevin Galligan, private secretary to Minister for Agriculture, Simon Coveney (FG). “This reorganisation has and continues to yield significant annual savings to the exchequer in the order of € 30 million.”
This decision means that Clare will continue to be the only county in Munster with no Department of Agriculture local offices – despite the fact that the department continue to own a building on the Kilrush Road in Ennis.