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This project is proposed in an attempt to stabilise and promote the position of the goat as: the basis for dairy, fibre, and possibly meat, enterprises; a low capital cost addition to small holdings; an asset to the management of agricultural wastes, and landscapes; and a general educational tool.
The Context
Throughout the European Union, and most of the developed world, there is an increased interest in the use of "natural" foods and fibres, and in the context of the Common Agricultural Policy, the pressure for farmers to find alternative market-led enterprises is obvious. Under the Rural Environment Protection Scheme farmers are encouraged to reduce their chemical use on the land, and there should be an increased role for an animal capable of grazing scrub and "weeds" and turning them into useful products including fertiliser.
Stemming the tide of rural depopulation, in this country, in the face of labour shedding in both mainstream farming and industry, means finding ways for those remaining in the countryside, and those persuaded to return to it, to raise their standard and quality of living. The physically small size, and low unit cost, fits the goat for incorporation into a small holding. It may also, therefore, be well suited to those sections of society with limited capital resources: many women, the unemployed and the disabled. There is a move to develop the Spanish and Greek goat industries, though starting from an unimproved base, and a great deal of interest has been shown recently in Germany. France has the largest goat industry with a population of approximately one million animals. Britain has in the region of one hundred and fifty thousand animals, including some of the best dairy stock in Europe, and has in recent years imported the nucleus of a fibre producing herd. Angora (mohair), Cashgora and Cashmere, fibres are all processed industrially; in fact forty percent of the world's Mohair production is imported for this purpose. This country has only about ten percent of the British herd, and most of it is unimproved.
The Promoter
Ed Harper received a BA Degree, in Social Sciences in 1970. and a Post-Graduate Certificate of Education, in 1971. from the University of York, England. He taught post-sixteen students, for eight years, at Kidderminster College of Further Education, before moving to Cape Clear Island, off the West Cork coast, to set up Cleire Goats, and Harpercraft, with his wife Winifred. Since 1979. the family have run the businesses, on the island, employing both full-time and part-time workers, as required. A range of nine products, using milk and meat, from the pedigree goat herd, has been produced, wholesaled and retailed; and stock has been sold. The farm has welcomed visitors from all over the world, during the tourist season. The farm is registered for the production of ice-cream and cottage cheese, though its most well-known product was Cais Cleire (see cover of "Island Development" the report of the Interdepartmental Co-ordinating Committee On Island Development, 1996), which has been unfortunately discontinued. Ed Harper is a member of the British Goat Society, the British Alpine (goat) Breed Society, Goat Producers Association, and the Irish Farmers' Association.
Goat Resource Unit.
This project, through the vehicle of a self-financing small business, aims: to gather and disseminate knowledge of the goat; to promote the welfare of the goat, and the production and consumption of products derived from it.
Needs Served by Project
1. The need for a central information exchange point, for existing and potential goat-farmers, hobby goat-keepers, customers of products and relevant authorities.
2. The need for improvement in animal welfare, by providing easy access to husbandry information.
3. The need to stabilise and improve, both the local and national, goat herds.
4. The need to promote production and marketing of goat products.
5. The need to provide a link between second level students and farming.
6. The need for agricultural college students and existing farmers to be able to gain training in goat farming.
7. The need for city-dwellers thinking of re-locating to the countryside to have access to a realistic rural experience.
The Concept
The Goat Resource Unit project presents a unique multifaceted approach to the problems of a fractured and deteriorating sector of the rural economy, by collating and disseminating information, providing a range of services, and carrying on education and training, it aims to stem the decline of goat husbandry in this country; both absolutely, and in relation to France, Britain, Germany, Spain, and Greece. The small business format permits the Goat Resource Unit to have all the advantages of flexibility and responsiveness of a small agency.
Courses
Other than a limited amount of advice available from Teagasc, it is not possible easily, to obtain information, education or training about the goat. Students from this country and northern Ireland are going to Britain. The nearest available courses, apart from those mounted occasionally by British agricultural colleges, are held at Ottley college near Ipswich in Suffolk. There are no centres in this country offering activity holiday courses in goat keeping. It is intended that a range of courses will be developed, which will include: educational visits from first and second level students; outreach visits to schools; work with transition year second level students; input into science elements of junior and leaving certificate courses, which will probably prove particularly applicable to the proposed increased vocational aspect of second level qualifications, put forward in "Charting our Education Future" education white paper (1995); modules suitable for inclusion in agricultural college courses, using the goat resource unit as a specialised venue; packages for those considering resettlement, which could also include inputs from other farmers and growers in the locality; and holiday courses aimed at home and overseas markets. The visually impaired will be particularly welcome on all the courses provided, and it would be possible to develop a course with a more specific rehabilitative content for this group. Attempts will be made to accommodate people with other disabilities.
The Community
As seen above the project emphasises serving all aspects of the community through its courses. Additionally, efforts will be made to integrate the herd into the local agricultural community. Demonstrating the important place the goat can occupy as converter of vegetable crop wastes into fertiliser. Courses will be run on the Cleire Goats farm on the island,throughout the year.
If the aims of the project are to be met, and the perceived needs fulfilled, then basic services must be provided.
1. Stock Register
There is no national register of pedigree stock. Fibre goats can be registered in Britain, with the British Angora Goat Society, and the dairy breeds with the British Goat Society. The Irish Goat Producers Association, with about three hundred members, is much larger than the Irish Goat Club, and contains all the larger herds. Its registrations officer reports a steady decline in animals registered with the British societies. There is no simple and easy way for a prospective buyer, in this country, to find pedigree stock. The bulk of the goat population is not pedigreed. In fact the structure of population is uncertain. The 1991 census showed a population of seventeen thousand goats. In 1993 just over a thousand people applied for headage grants on approximately five and a half thousand animals. By 1994, this had fallen to just over five hundred applicants, with about three and a half thousand goats. There are a number of factors affecting headage applications, but the only certain thing is that despite the Department of Agriculture's attempts to find out about those herds they have contact with, more animals are becoming invisible. The proposed register would make available information on quality stock, pedigree and other, and could, especially if the Department of Agriculture would consider minor policy changes, bring back into existence the "invisible" goat population. Obviously, this has implications for the disease status of the national herd, as well as its genetic quality.
2. Telemart
For the register to succeed, goat owners need to see a reason for registering their stock. There is no rational national market in goats. It is no harder to sell unregistered, or poor quality stock, than registered animals; and it is difficult to get a premium price for pedigree stock. With a scattered goat population of small size, the logical approach is to use information technology to bring together buyers and sellers. This has been done with the deer population in Britain, and on a larger scale is being developed for cattle sales.
3. Production Recording and Artificial Insemination
The recording of milk, meat and fibre performance of individual animals, and the application of artificial insemination to boost the numbers of desirable individuals in the national herd, is only novel inasmuch as it is proposed to promote its application to goats. A company, "Caprine and Ovine Breeding Services." was set up in the 1980s, in Britain, for this purpose.
4. Producer and Consumer Databases
Data will be collected on goat products available, both those originating in the State, and those imported, and from where they can be obtained. This information should be open to the wholesale and retail food and catering trades, as well as to the general public. Because of the fractured state of the goat industry, it can be very difficult for those wishing, or needing, to buy goat products, to find them. This is acting to suppress demand, as in many cases substitution takes place. The list of "Consumers" would include wholesale and retail, commercial and catering outlets and individual customers, seeking or regularly buying goat products. This would provide a market opportunity list for producers. Individual customers would also need access to this set of data to find sources of product. These sets of data will serve to bring together buyers and sellers of goat products, and make more possible the tailoring of production to markets, and the extending of those markets at home and abroad.
This project, if successful, would provide an interesting addition to the activity holiday sector of West Cork; give practical meaning to parts of the education of children; offer an economic way of including an "alternative enterprise" option in agricultural college courses; give a rewarding experience, and possibly a way into small holding or farming, to disadvantaged groups; provide, training and support services to goat farmers and, hopefully, the impetus and enthusiasm necessary to reverse the spiral of decline for goats and their farmers. If this project does not succeed, or some other radical action is not taken, then: the Department of Agriculture's support, through the Alternative Enterprise Scheme, the Dairy Hygiene Scheme, and headage grants, will probably be evaporated like water on a desert, with little to show for it. In time, the quality of the national herd will continue to decline, and even more goat products will be imported from other E.U. Countries, as Irish tastes coincide with those of Europe. The goat will increasingly become the preserve of the crank, and the abused pet of the uninformed, and this country will have abandoned the third leg of the ruminant food animal tripod (cattle, goats and sheep) on which human farming has stood for thousands of years.
Address of Promoter : Ed Harper, Cleire Goats, Cape Clear, Skibbereen, Co.Cork Tel. (028)39126
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