Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-01-16-Speech-2-184"
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"en.20010116.10.2-184"2
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".
Mr President, Commissioner, honourable Members, I should like to start by thanking Mr Parish for his serious analysis of the situation of young farmers in Europe. I ask you, what shall we do when there is no one to take over our farms? Structural change is important and it is right, but that should not result in a mass exodus from the farming profession.
If we want farming to have a future in Europe, then we must secure its succession. We are in favour of a multi-functional farming model, i.e. a model whereby farmers are not just responsible for producing food and a large part of their work benefits society as a whole, a society which can take pleasure in seeing nature unspoiled and enjoy rural areas which are worth living in. The agricultural policy and the policy for the countryside as a whole lives for and from its inhabitants.
We therefore need to create framework conditions which ensure that young people look on the countryside as somewhere worth living in and are willing to continue the farming tradition. Setting-up aid and investment grants are essential for young farmers, but modern technology has an equally important part to play. Young farmers need to be as familiar with computers and the Internet as they are with seed and the animals in their stalls. This means that training and further training for young farmers are becoming more and more important and I, for one, support lifelong learning in farming and among farmers.
Allow me to say a few brief words on the social aspects. Time and again I hear farmers using various arguments to put off leaving their farms to their children or successors. Letting go is difficult, as I know from personal experience, but it is the only way of ensuring survival. So I call on the older generations to help the young and to give them and, hence, the whole farming industry the same chance which they had. Of course, and I say this quite openly as a farmer myself, it is no help when all we hear about is the down side of the profession. Let us be quite clear about one thing: there is not a single profession which is either all good or all bad.
Finally, I should like to say that it gladdens my heart when I see established and young farmers working together to develop the farm, exchanging experiences and creating and putting innovative ideas into practice. Their dedication and commitment will be needed in the future even more than ever and we must encourage successive generations to be optimistic and take their future into their own hands."@en1
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