A cow, possibly Finnish
I had lunch today with one of our Vice-Presidents, Seppo Kallio (a Finn, from the Various Interests Group), and the President of his organisation, the Finnish Central Union of Agricultural Producers and Forest Owners, Mr Juha Marttila. Like some of our members, when Mr Marttila isn’t busy being President of his organisation, he is a farmer. The discussion was a graphic illustration of an obvious point. When somebody like Mr Marttila talks to me about what he represents, he knows what he’s talking about. (In the course of our discussions I learnt, for example, that the average Finnish farm has two or three cows – compare and contrast that with, say, the average UK farm!) Therein, in effect, lies the authenticity of the European Economic and Social Committee; its members are nominated precisely in order to represent an organisation of interests of one sort or another and they truly know what they are talking about.
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