FROM holidaying on a farm in Ireland as a little girl to meeting The Queen to receive an MBE that is the journey that Miriam Parker has made. Little did she know that when she fell in love with looking after livestock in her younger days it would have such an impact on the industry in future years.

A great uncle had a typically small farm in Northern Ireland and back in the sixties Miriam remembers chickens running around the yard, her great aunt wearing the seemingly permanent, flowery pinny and each day, the aroma of freshly baked bread. "I really enjoyed it," she said. "And when we moved to Cheshire there was little farming connection, except at the back of the school there were fields with livestock. But then came the Foot and Mouth outbreak and the animals disappeared. It is something I sadly, remember vividly."

Like many young girls, Miriam began to badger her parents about wanting to ride. To prove her commitment she cycled 3 miles to muck out stables and in return was allowed to ride a pony. It was her earliest experience of getting her hands dirty but it was to be a good lesson for later life.

In the late 1960s the family moved back to Northern Ireland where Miriam spent her teenage years 'throughout the troubles'. "There I got to ride a neighbour's pony that lived with a donkey and he also kept pigs and cattle. I looked after the pony but also helped with the other livestock and loved it. From then on I knew I wanted to be involved in agriculture.

"One of my earliest memories is dragging my toes whilst walking to church. Mother said 'you're walking like some old farmer' and I abruptly replied 'good'.

"The farmer whose animals I helped with encouraged me greatly. He spent time explaining about lots of things and suggested I go into farming."

Without the A Levels needed to go to university, Miriam embarked on an HND in Agriculture at Edinburgh. A girl studying agriculture was rare in those days and in her year she found herself one of only 5 girls to 50 boys. Female and basically from a town background the mandatory pre-entry practical period on a dairy farm was a real baptism by fire. "At the start of it I had never driven a tractor forward never mind reverse! But by the end of it I was trusted to milk two herds of pedigree Friesians. It was hard but you have to start with a basic job, I learnt so much and owe a great deal to the Wallace Family for their endless patience."

During her mid-year of college, Miriam worked on a beef, sheep and arable farm and after the final year became assistant herd manager for 250 dairy cows in Sussex; where she stayed for two years. Then the opportunity to take time out for a further degree was offered and Miriam went to Ayr to take the Institute of Biology course in animal science. "During that time I worked on a hill farm, shepherding and got involved with ultra-sound scanning, which was a new technique just being tried. Two years later after qualifying, I went to work for the Scottish Agricultural College (SAC) at Langhill, I fed and milked cows but was also involved in many of the research projects on the farm at a time when animal welfare was beginning to become a subject in its own right and the Farm Animal Welfare Council had just been set up.

"As well as the early animal welfare and behavioural researchers, I was fortunate to work with an exceptional herdsmen and practical stockman - Jim Mills - who could see the benefits of sympathetic animal handling.

"By some twist of fate I was taking animals into slaughter from the research farm and was rather cross about how they were being handled and around the same time an advert appeared in the farming press for a job with the Humane Slaughter Association."

Miriam got the job and made the move that was to shape her career and motivate her much more than she realised at the time.

From Technical Officer, Miriam went on to become Technical Director. The Humane Slaughter Association was a small operation at the time but Miriam was determined to improve livestock handling and improve her knowledge of such. She won the Royal Smithfield Club Nuffield Farming Scholarship in 1989 and went to the USA to study how farm animals were handled there. It was a radical decision on the selection panels' part, for animal welfare had not previously been considered for such awards.

"Working for the HSA allowed me to work with people in the industry - those who actually do the job of slaughtering animals and we were soon looking at rewarding good behaviour and forgetting bad, so as to improve welfare and reduce unnecessary suffering. I do not look upon farm animals in a cuddly, sentimental way but with a pragmatic and just attitude. Most livestock is bred to be eaten but we can look after them and handle them in a respectful manner and abuse should never be tolerated."

Leaving the HSA in 2000, Miriam set up her own consultancy 'Livestockwise' and now acts as a specialist consultant for various companies and organisations, from M&S to the RSPCA. She still gets her hands dirty though (those early days were a priceless training ground) and continues to enter slaughter houses for anything from general inspections to trouble shooting handling facilities. But her work does not take her down the campaigning route. "Oh no, I view it as if we've got a problem let's solve it."

Now, Miriam is sent out to solve lots of problems. Working alongside staff, she assesses what the tasks they are doing are really like and how they could possibly be improved and to bridge the gap between producers, retailers and welfare organisations so looks for a middle ground that takes account of the effects on livestock involved.

One of the hardest experiences that Miriam has had to deal with that will no doubt haunt her for years to come, was her work on the welfare cull during the 2001 Foot and Mouth outbreak.

"The difference between actually having to manage a situation and deliver at the coal face is staggering. It is all about man management and we forget that at our peril. I think the FMD crisis was a defining moment for me and the way I had until then approached things. Just because you write a booklet doesn't mean you get the message across. In farming things happen through word of mouth and experience and training and skill is paramount when dealing with livestock - even more so if you are killing them. The motivation for this belief was the footage seen during the dealing with FMD. I said 'If anyone handles my animals like that I'll kill them'. When slaughtering livestock you have to get the right people, who have the skill needed, who recognise the feeling of the animals' owners and who make the task less barbarous as a result."

But it's not just cattle, sheep and pigs that Miriam concerns herself, for there are improvements needed for better poultry welfare, she believes.

"Basically, the issue with poultry at the moment is that the people handling poultry usually have to handle thousands and there is little opportunity to deal with the birds on a one to one level. We almost need the education process of thinking of birds as individuals. The people that are involved in the commercial poultry industry have to work on economy of size; they have been pushed in that direction. We should all pay much more for chickenmeat so that birds could be kept in lower numbers and a more natural environment."

On poultry transport for example the assessment of whether the bird is fit to travel should be the same, whether you are moving one bird or thousands. In practice the difference between moving commercial birds to say, exhibition birds, is so extreme; there is one method of working on a large scale and another on a small sale, which wouldn't happen with cattle or sheep. So I question whether or not that is acceptable?"

The movement of livestock is taking up a lot of Miriam's time at present because along with a film company 'Animal-I', she is in the process of making a DVD about the new European Regulation on livestock movement that comes into force in January 2007. (The new rules affecting poultry will be covered in the January issue of SMALLHOLDER).

Even with a very heavy work schedule, Miriam was pleased to take a day off to visit Buckingham Palace for her investiture, an MBE for services to farming. "I was totally surprised but delighted and it was wonderful meeting The Queen, who asked me what I did? When I replied, 'I go in and out of slaughterhouses', Her Majesty thought that a real conversation stopper!

"The MBE citation is interesting as it puts animal welfare as a core theme of farming - where it should be in my view as the people who have the most significant responsibility and can make the difference are the keepers and handlers of the animals!"

But the work doesn't stop with another award and the welfare message is being spread further afield.

"I'm now looking abroad, transferring messages globally at a practical level. For instance, in places like India, production is paramount but the welfare message is not there yet. We have to convince them that good health and wellbeing of the animals is good for you the producer but it needs to be done sensitively, for we have to consider the culture of the country.

"In the UK I think good welfare is still about communication. It sounds bizarre but it's the assumption that everybody must know about something because it's in a scientific paper but this is not the case. A change in mindset is what I would like to see, getting people to think laterally and consider how you can persuade an animal to work with you and think of its needs.

"Understanding animal behaviour certainly helps you to realise why handling of livestock is so important and it's getting the message across at ground level, where it's got to work that is essential."

Without doubt, Miriam Parker MBE has made a positive contribution to the welfare of farmed animals, not only in the UK but increasingly abroad. Little did that Irish farmer know what seed he was sowing when he encouraged a young girl to work with livestock!