Alicia Bugeja Said: I Was Looked Down Upon At School Because I Come From A Farming Family
New Parliamentary Secretary for Fisheries Alicia Bugeja Said has used her own personal experience to try and explain why few people want to become farmers and fishers nowadays.
“We must look ahead, not only to facilitate the current situation [of food inflation] but also to solve the problem of a lack of new blood and renewal in these sectors,” Bugeja Said said on ONE Radio.
“This problem has been building up over the years. I come from a family of farmers and fishers and I remember that I wasn’t exactly looked at with respect as a secondary student.”
“This was in 2005; nowadays these sectors are respected more, not only because of the sacrifice the jobs entail but because we all need to eat every day.”
Bugeja Said warned that Malta and Europe are facing serious demographic challenges when it comes to farming and fishing, warning that for every farmer and fisher younger than 40 there are three older than 65.
The new Parliamentary Secretary had expanded on these problems during an interview with Lovin Malta ahead of the election in which she insisted the island must become more self-sufficient when it comes to food production.
“If you have the land but you don’t have the people to work the land, it’s an issue,” she had said.
Besides the social stigma attached to farming and fishing, Bugeja Said also pinned the blame on the EU’s Common Agricultural and Fisheries policies.
“These policies promoted the economic efficiency model, resulting in fewer farmers tilling more land and fewer fishers catching more fish, a model which I believe leads to a lack of social fabric in policies,” she said.
“Statistics show our policies require more social fabric, which is why the reform of out common agricultural policy is putting more focus on demographics.”
Would you ever consider becoming a farmer or a fisher?
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