Tom Byrne, Patrick McCormick, Teresa Roche, Richard Moeran and Christine Friel - IFA members who occupied the offices of Bord Bia on Pembroke Road for 28 days. Photograph: Alan Betson
In early February, a young man, dressed all in navy, pushed a trolley stacked with cardboard boxes through the crowd of protesting farmers and towards the glass doors of Bord Bia’s headquarters on Pembroke Road in Dublin.
Armed with a delivery docket, he looked like one of the many couriers that the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) members had observed coming and going since they first started their demonstration against Larry Murrin continuing as the chair of the State agency’s board.
Once the young man was buzzed through both the first and second glass doors by the innocent reception staff, the farmers lunged forward and an estimated 50 people rushed in behind him. They used bales of straw to keep the automatic doors open.
What Bord Bia staff believed to be a delivery driver was in fact an IFA staffer who had dressed up as part of a plot to get demonstrators inside for a “sit in” demonstration.
The initial group of 50 depleted to what became known as “the Bord Bia Five” – a small group of IFA demonstrators who occupied the building for 28 days.
It effectively shut down the agri-food investment
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