Mr. Martin McKendry:

I thank the Chair for the invitation to speak to the committee today. First I would like to outline the College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise, CAFRE’s, role in the Northern Ireland education system, its governance structure and how it is used as a key policy lever in the delivery of Government policy. I will provide some key facts and figures about CAFRE and enrolment of students from the South on its courses.

CAFRE is the only land-focused college in Northern Ireland. It delivers further and higher education, knowledge transfer and innovation programmes across agriculture, horticulture, food, equine and rural enterprise. We have just over 2,000 students on our FE and HE programmes. We deliver those across three campuses in Antrim, Cookstown and Enniskillen. We also deliver knowledge transfer and innovation programmes to approximately 14,000 people who work within the agrifood industry.

Our corporate governance structure unique within these islands in that it is the only land-focused college that operates as a division of a Government Department. This means all CAFRE staff, including myself, are employees of the Northern Ireland Civil Service. I, as CAFRE director, report to the Deputy Secretary within the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, DAERA. The legislative basis for our programmes is provided by the Agriculture Act (Northern Ireland)1949, which empowers DAERA to provide instruction in agriculture and related subjects. This means that we work quite closely with the Department for the Economy, which created the legislative framework for the FE colleges and for the funding of both further education colleges and higher education Institutions.

Given CAFRE’s position in DAERA, the nature and content of its programme delivery is determined by the DAERA knowledge framework. This framework sets out the rationale for involvement in education, knowledge transfer and innovation and commits to improving educational attainment in the North’s agrifood sector. It is underpinned by a range of principles including commitments to lifelong learning, accessibility, enhanced collaboration and partnership across the education sector.

In the history of CAFRE we have always had enrolments from the South on our courses, however this varies across the disciplines. Equine is by far the most popular, with students from the South comprising between 30% and 40% of our enrolments. However, over the last ten years there has been a drop in enrolments in our other disciplines, so the figures have been slowly falling from nearly 10% of our FE and HE student body to about 5% last year. I would suggest that there are several reasons for this decline including, but not necessarily limited to, competition with new and emerging programmes in the Republic of Ireland, differentials in fees, challenges with marketing of programmes in the recent pandemic years and, as has been alluded to in both the report and at last week's session, the misalignment of the UCAS and CAO systems. I should point out that those larger structural issues like the applications process would be addressed by our Department of Education in the North. We within DAERA and CAFRE would take our line from them.

I welcome the opportunity this afternoon to engage with the committee and to look at potential steps that could be taken to reduce any friction affecting cross-Border flows in both the further and higher education sectors. Members should note though, as Heather Cousins raised last week, that any recommendations for policy change in Northern Ireland would be impacted by the current lack of an Executive and any policy decisions would be for an incoming Minister.

I thank the joint committee for the opportunity to discuss its report and to share with Members the role CAFRE plays in the delivery of our programmes, both North and South.