Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the officials from the Department. I dealt with Mr. O'Driscoll for many years in a different role and it has always been a pleasure to work with him.

I want to make a number of points. With regard to the major challenges Brexit poses for us, there is a huge amount of North-South trade. Three million litres of milk a day comes from the North to the South to be processed. Forty per cent of Northern Ireland cattle are brought South to be killed and processed. What impact will that have on the quality assurance schemes we operate here? How will that work into the future? The United Kingdom can operate to different standards from the ones to which we operate here, namely, EU standards. How will that be dealt with in the future?

Deputy McConalogue mentioned the huge difficulties for the beef sector. This is the perennial chestnut in that once our kill exceeds 30,000 head of cattle, market prices go one way. Has there been a submission from the board of Bord Bia in terms of the extra funding it would require to lessen our dependence on the UK market with the upcoming Brexit? Also, what level of resources is Bord Bia putting into live exports? I sat on the board of Bord Bia for a number of years and I often felt that not enough funding was put into sourcing live export outlets for our cattle, and that there was a reluctance on the part of some members of the board to promote live exports. However, we have a significant number of extra cattle coming on-stream. We have had a kill for the past four weeks of 36,000 head but the reality is that next year we will have at least another 100,000 or 120,000 extra stock in the country, which will make a poor situation worse.

Deputy McConalogue made a point about live exports and asked about the number of vessels available to us to get the cattle out of the country. While the Turkish market is open, they are taking a specialised, younger type animal. In the short to medium term, they will not have an impact on the number of cattle killed.

The UK would be a significant market for forward stores. We have found it very difficult to get our cattle killed on an even keel in the UK. Can progress be made on that? If we can export forward stores to the UK, can equal access be secured for them alongside UK cattle to slaughter units in the UK?

Mr. O'Driscoll referred to the uptake of the milk reduction scheme. Applicants can apply for as much under this scheme as they want and no penalty is imposed if there is not full uptake of it. I believe the uptake here will be small. We have had a very good October weather wise and, thankfully, prices have started to recover but we have come through a difficult period of milk prices. Has any analysis been done of when northern European countries will start to increase production again? Prices have been driven up by the reduction in production in several parts of the world. Germany and France have dramatically reduced production, as has the UK. Argentina and New Zealand are having their own weather problems and that has also impacted on production worldwide. With the price of grain at its current level, when will be the next curve that will see a milk production increase? Our industry cannot afford another hit like the one we got over the past 12 to 18 months. Some measure will have to be put in place. Changes to the income tax system for farmers are proposed in the Finance Bill but that will not go any way towards allowing farmers to deal with the current volatility being experienced.

With regard to the afforestation programme, the hen harrier is referenced a number of times in the report we received from Mr. O'Driscoll. If we are to have any hope of meeting the target set in that programme, the blanket ban on forestry plantation in special areas of conservation will have to be reviewed and analysed. There is evidence that the hen harrier will thrive in areas where there are different stages of growth of afforestation. I have been told that the special areas of conservation figures are decreasing where blanket bans are in place. It is crucial that we meet the target set for the afforestation programme at this time of climate change. That needs to be examined and researched.

Reference was made to the decrease in the incidence of bovine tuberculosis, TB. If we were to talk to farmers in County Wicklow, we would not get agreement on that. While we have made great progress on the vaccination of badgers - and where there was a breakdown in tackling the problems presented by badgers - we have ignored the problem of deer contributing to the spread of TB. We have had a very bad outbreak in the past two weeks in my county, which has seen a decrease of 80% to 85% in dairy herds. There would be forestries near those holdings. We have to research whether deer numbers are contributing to the spread of TB, how they are contracting it and from which species are they being infected. I saw figures for County Wicklow which show that 18% of deer that were captured had TB.

It will be an ongoing issue and the Department must address it. We cannot ignore the deer population. Recently, I met farmers from Wicklow who feel that the issue of the deer population must be tackled immediately.

The Secretary General talked about Animal Health Ireland and the progress we have made on disease. In the bovine viral diarrhoea, BVD, eradication programme, the non-compulsory removal of persistently infected animals, PIs, was inexcusable. At the start of the scheme, we were promised it would last three years. Farmers are getting worried that it will run and run. I cannot understand how PIs were left in herds. I know the rules have been tightened. However, it should never have happened. There should have been legislation with the scheme to specify that PIs had to be automatically removed. Farmers cannot understand it. The failure to remove PIs was unacceptable.

The Secretary General talked about tenders for tags. We are moving from the single tender of the past to multiple tenders. The standard of our tags cannot be compromised. We have built up our reputation as producers of top-quality food based on our traceability scheme and our tags have stood up to much scrutiny over a number of years. However the tender works out, the security of tags must not be compromised.

On the single farm payment issue, improvements have been made and there are not as many people waiting for their single farm or areas of natural constraint, ANC, payments as there were last year. However, there are still too many, in a year when farmers incomes are on the floor. I cannot comprehend that, with all our computerised systems, where an application is submitted in mid-May and money is due in mid-October, a farmer finds out there is a problem only when he or she does not receive the money. It must be more streamlined and farmers must be told in mid-summer if there is a problem in order to allow time to resolve it so the payment can be made in time. Farmers' cashflows are at a low ebb. I have received a number of calls since the single farm payment was issued last week. The satellite inspections should all be dealt with before the payment deadline. It is not acceptable.

Approvals are still very slow to come from the targeted agricultural modernisation schemes, TAMS. We have dairy farmers who want to do work during the dry cow period. A number have contacted me, and approvals are very slow. It must be speeded up. When an application goes in for approval, we need something. There must be a turnaround period for the applications. It is not fast enough and it must be improved. Last Friday morning, I contacted my local office and they told me they did not have the computer system to issue payments for work completed. I know farmers who have had their work done since last spring. To be told there is no system in their local office to issue their payments is incomprehensible. It must be sorted immediately.

The Secretary General mentioned organic farming. When the quality assurance inspection is being done, there should be a section for farmers who want to seek organic status so they could be certified on the same day. A couple of organic farmers groups have raised this with me. There are different criteria for different organic organisations. The Department and Bord Bia should get hold of the organic sector and make it part of the quality assurance inspection system. We have a dairy side and a beef side. It would be very easy to have an organic side for those who want to opt for it and have all the inspections done in one visit.