Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Irish Organic Farmers and Growers Association, IOFGA, for the presentation. Do the representatives think that many small farmers - those with ten to 16 ha - left organic farming because it was more attractive to participate in the GLAS scheme? This has happened all over the country and I see in my area the farmers have walked away from organic farming. There was also the differential between the prices being charged by the licensing authorities compared to the cost of drawing up a GLAS plan. When the farmers did the sums they would find that they would be better off by €2,000 to €2,500 per year by being in GLAS as opposed to farming organically. Is that the major problem face by IOFGA?

The Department was asked to reduce the acreage needed to farm organically to try to retain the smaller operators, but it did not accede to the request because the Department said it wanted to meet the targets. It is clear from the figures supplied that we are not meeting the targets we set ourselves.

When one looks at the different sectors of agriculture it appears that farmers prefer to have livestock. Why is that? Most of the farmers I know bring their cattle to the commercial marts rather than to special sales because they get the same price. Why is the organic producer not getting a premium price? Are we not marketing our product sufficiently?

When farmers supply to the drinks industry, they are price takers. If one keeps telling a producer that they are a price taker, they will get fed up of taking the price because they will go out of business. The industry needs the raw material. I concur with every other member that if one is selling Irish whiskey, all the raw materials should be Irish and should not be mixed with crops from other countries. Why does the drinks industry not do a five or ten year plan to guarantee security of product? We have the figures that the raw materials cost in the region of 5 cent in the pint. It does not matter whether it would be 6 cent or 7 cent, but that additional 2 cent would give a premium price to the farmer and buy in to doing a deal with the industry down the road. Why does the industry not do that rather than every year bantering over a few pounds with people walking away from supplying the raw material? The industry could ensure the security of supply of the raw materials.

It is great to see that in County Roscommon an announcement was made that planning permission is being sought for a new whiskey distillery. This is happening around the country. However, we must remember that if we keeping pulling a dog's tail, he will bite. What is happening is that if the industry wrangles every year and farmers have to take a low price, the industry will lose them.

The industry is portraying the product as Irish, grown in a clean environment and everything is done in Ireland, but in fact the company is bringing in most of the organic produce from Poland and other countries that are the bread basin of the world. Why will the industry not do a deal with Irish producers instead of engaging in a ding-dong every year? That is not helping the industry. If the different pieces of the jigsaw are not in place, that will not help the industry.