Irish Farmers Journal Weekly Podcast

In this week's podcast, Irish Farmers Journal news journalist Odile Evans asks Teagasc economist Thia Hennessy what the 2016 economic forecast has in store for Irish farmers. The Northern Ireland helpline Rural Support has seen an increase in calls from farmers experiencing difficulties, its chief executive Jude McCann tells Northern Ireland editor David Wright. Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney speaks to market specialist Phelim O'Neill on a trade mission to Nigeria and Ghana in west Africa about gaining more markets for Irish beef and progress in the beef forum. At the Paris climate conference, digital editor Thomas Hubert met Oisín Coghlan, director of Friends of the Earth Ireland, and Dutch-based academic Geert Jan Nabuurs author of a study on options to use European forests in efforts to combat greenhouse gas emissions. James Mimnagh, contributor to the Farmer Writes column in the Irish Farmers Journal, tells us about his suckler and dairy farm and his plans to use antibiotics less systematically wh