Paul Soden (left) with Dan Boyle

I last met Paul in February. He was something of a force of nature, somewhat ironic as nature was a theme he enthusiatically chose to promote. Paul had left Cork and Ireland some years earlier, seeking not only to live somewhere else but also to live another kind of life.

He went to Brazil where he became a farmer, as far removed from his previous life as he could get. He lived, worked and raised a family in a remote part of the country, equidistant from Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Despite his radical change of lifestyle his initial approach to farming was quite conservative. He bought into the idea that nutrients needed to be artificially added, in vast quantities, to make land arable.

He soon saw this approach was having the opposite effect. He worked with others in his new community to practice regenerative farming. Working with rather than against nature, he and they saw this as a better way of doing things.

While he loved his new locale and his very different way of life, he wanted to share what he was learning with as many people as possible.

He returned to Ireland several times. On each visit he would seek to meet with as many people as he could to share his experience of farming with nature, and how Irish agriculture would benefit if it would also change.

His February itinerary was typical of such visits. He spoke at a number of events in Galway, and in Kinsale. He spoke at a seminar at University College Cork. I organised a meeting for him at Cork City Hall, where he also met with the then Lord Mayor, who was someone who he had gone to school with.

That was Paul’s great strength. He wasn’t messianic. He didn’t seek to hammer home his values. He chose instead to relate to people with warmth and empathy.

I found him to be supportive and encouraging of me. Like many in politics I suffer from Imposter Syndrome. Because I speak more of the experience of others than those of myself, I’m always aware that undermines my credibility.Somehow Paul saw past that. He would ask me to introduce him at events, and to introduce him to others.

He saw networking as a global opportunity. He worked with the Kiss The Ground Foundation, an organisation that promotes environmental policies through documentaries. They had made a documentary on his work in Brazil. Paul would have seen this as an opening feature. This year he was promoting the Kiss The Ground documentary, narrated by the actor Woody Harrelson, shown through Netflix.

The last time I physically saw Paul was through a Zoom meeting I had organised with Minister of State, Pippa Hackett, herself an organic farmer.He was as enthusiastic as ever, greatly looking forward to his next trip to Ireland, whenever this ‘thing’ would be behind us.

I learned of his death through a third party who presumed I had heard. It was later again I discovered his death was covid related. That was from a phone call from the wife of a man, now in his nineties, whom we mutually knew. Our last conversation was on how we would meet in the future to celebrate this man’s life.

Paul was younger than I am and far more healthy. I see his death as emblematic of the year we have been living through. I see his legacy as something I would like to encourage in others.

It was an honour to know you Sir.

Dan Boyle is a former Green Party TD and Senator and serves as a Green Party councillor on Cork City Council. His column appears here every Thursday. Follow Dan on Twitter: @sendboyle