Séamus Kirk (Louth, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this motion, which is very timely and reflects Deputy Ó Cuív's interest in developing, consolidating and stabilising the position of the agriculture industry. I take this opportunity to congratulate the new Minister of State, Deputy Ann Phelan, and wish her well in her responsibility for rural affairs. I do not wish to develop the point at this stage but I would like to raise with her the issue of the Leader companies and who will have responsibility for them. Will it be a rural affairs or an environment responsibility? Given the resources which, hopefully, will be available under Pillar 2, it will be important that the Minister of State's office and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine will have direct control over and input into them.

This debate affords us the opportunity to discuss and consider the serious and growing pressure on farm incomes. The issue of the long-term sustainability of the agrifood sector is dependent on predictable and fair prices for produce. I know the thrust of the discussion has been on the beef sector but there are other sectors in the agriculture industry which are under severe pressure. I am thinking, for instance, of potato growers, about whom Deputy McEntee spoke. Quite a number of large-scale potato growers in County Meath and in my own county of Louth are under severe pressure because of the very high cost involved in producing crops and because of the price situation.

There is a dangerous spiral in milk prices. Nobody can say when the plateaux will be hit. We are moving to the liquid milk production period of the winter months and the economics of that are doubtful. Quite a few people are seriously considering moving to spring milk production and moving away from liquid milk production in the winter months. That would not be good for the marketplace and for the overall position of the dairy sector. It is an issue the Minister needs to urgently examine.

We also have the problem of cereal prices, which is not a north east problem. The market for cereals is depressed.

The supply of cereals worldwide, however, is up on previous years. It is a case of the old supply and demand consideration but it needs to be examined. The cost of machinery and of running cereal farms is such that unless there is a fair and predictable return for produce, people will exit the industry. The issue of introducing taxation measures to encourage greater land mobility will become irrelevant in that context because if the economics of production are not right, people will have to move on.

Unfortunately, the beef industry is being manipulated by processors and supermarkets. As the then Minister for Agriculture and Food, Deputy Brendan Smith introduced the Food Harvest 2020 strategy, which clearly set out achievable objectives. I wish we could return to the main thrust of the development policy contained in that strategy to ensure that we can move on and create real national wealth in this country.

Price volatility is the bane of everybody's life whether one is engaged in milk, beef or cereal production. Unless there is a decent margin of return for the primary producers they will find themselves in serious trouble. With the capital requirement to grow crops on an annual basis and run farms, farmers must have a predictable cash flow from their products.

Reference was made earlier to spending money on the suckler herd. There is no question that money spent on genomic upgrade and a temporary support for the sector to ensure that suckler producers remain in the industry is a no-brainer in terms of decision-making. There is a clear, tangible and obvious benefit to the beef industry both in the short and the long term. As the Minister of State, Deputy Tom Hayes, will know, there has been significant investment in the genomic upgrade of the suckler herd in recent years. That is a slow process. It takes time to get the genetic upgrade into place but it has been significant. The quality of animals coming out at the finished stage are excellent by any standards.

The big problem we have is the processes, the lack of margin, and the serious losses producers have suffered over the past six or nine months. However, the one aspect of this debate that we cannot comprehend is the reason for the huge price differential between the price of cattle in the United Kingdom and the price of cattle in Ireland. People say there are trade barriers. Clearly, there are trade barriers but the problem is that the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine is standing on the sideline, and he is a helpless spectator in this context.

The Minister must get into the game and see what changes can be made and the hands-on initiatives he can take to redeem the situation as far as the industry is concerned. If he does that there will be some successes and some failures but it will reassure primary producers that the Minister for Agriculture of the day is genuinely and seriously concerned about the economic well-being of the estimated 100,000 suckler farmers in the country. Many of those are operating on a part-time basis because of the structure of farm ownership in Ireland. Many of them are at the other end, particularly on the east coast. They are full-time operators who buy the store cattle on the west coast and then bring them to the finishing farms and the feedlots on the east coast. There is an integrated dependency in all of that. We need good quality cattle coming from the west and the midlands into the east, and we need farmers with a financial capacity to buy such stock in the marketplace for a fair price, bring them home to their base of production, feed them and have them available at premium condition for hopefully a premium price.

The agriculture industry is important to the overall economy and has contributed to the economic recovery in the recent past. Exports from the agrifood sector has been the cornerstone of that economic recovery. It is important we realise that, plan for the future, examine the benefits of the supports Deputy Ó Cuív set out in his motion, and put them in place as quickly as possible.

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