Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank both gentlemen for their presentation and I welcome Mr. Scallan. Live exports are essential from the point of view of balancing the beef market and we cannot overestimate their importance. Mr. Scallan said 200,000 calves were our target and that we had the ferries, so the issue was lairage. Is there more potential for the market if we had the transport facilities? Are other countries going into veal units? Some 40,000 cattle per week are being killed, and if we take 200,000 calves out, it will not be enough to bring our market back into equilibrium. How many extra customers might there be and could we displace other countries with veal units?

Is another port an option? Will Mr. Scallan expand on the timelines and say if it is possible to go into a Dutch port with calves? How far does he have to travel from Cherbourg to the veal units after the rest period?

The density on trucks is a red herring and designed to make it uneconomical for us to export. We had this argument seven to ten years ago and we made costly alterations to the trucks we took to the Continent. I remember going to feedlots in Spain and Italy and looking at our weanlings, which caused us problems at the time. We had to get our house in order because if we do not bring healthy animals to these places, we will not hold customers for very long. No one wants an animal that arrives sick or unhealthy. We had to make sure the weanlings were weaned and vaccinated.

We have no export outlet for older animals, that is, animals aged 12 years or more. Could any such markets open up for us? Is there any possibility of expanding the number of weanlings that can be exported, especially the dairy variety that are kept on farms? The factories' focus is on getting Friesian bulls killed rather than the price. Farmers with bulls aged under 24 months are on their knees, begging meat processors to take the bulls off them and they are making less than a culled cow from a suckler herd. Is there any possibility of opening live markets for that type of stock? This might put extra pressure on processors.

Bord Bia is a promotional body that seeks to secure markets for us. Are the witnesses happy with Bord Bia's efforts to secure markets or do they feel its focus is more on processed meat? Should more resources be put in to drive the numbers up? Dairy cow numbers are going to continue to increase fairly significantly. We have been killing nearly 40,000 cattle per week for the past three months. It is as plain as the nose on one's face that, while the factories can kill them, they cannot sell them at an economical price for us. It is not financially viable for farmers to produce beef at the prices being paid at the moment. It would be great if we hit the target of 200,000, but even that would not be sufficient to put the market back into equilibrium.

The 12 hour rest period is, in my opinion, very reasonable.

I know calves that have been fed and had 12 hours rest in a warm bed will be in peak condition for continuing the journey. This issue has been raised before. Mr. Scallan said extra lairage space could be found four hours further from Cherbourg, but how near would that be to the final destination? Is it possible to get into a Dutch port? By how much would the current regulations on travel times be exceeded if live transports went to a Dutch port near the final destination?