Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Beef Plan Movement and Meat Industry Ireland for coming in and making their presentations. The Beef Plan Movement has achieved great traction around the country in recent months. The crisis that we have become used to has deepened into what might be called a super-crisis. We have heard a lot of what was in those submissions at the meetings we have attended around the country. I would like to address a couple of things. What advantages do the witnesses see in suckler-bred grass-fed beef? Why should that advantage be acknowledged and the product given special status? That is the first point. Personally I think it should be given special status to some extent. If we can raise that tide it will lift all boats.

The Beef Plan Movement's presentation ended with four asks, concerning the four-movement rule, the 70-day residency etc. If those goals were achieved what impact would they have in the short term, say within a month or two months? Why does the Beef Plan Movement believe they are so vital now? Where would achieving those goals leave us? Why would they make such a big difference in this market system? The market system is flawed because markets are always flawed, with forces pulling in all directions. Would they have an immediate impact on a market which is clearly over-supplied?

Of the issues raised by Meat Industry Ireland, I am concerned by the goal of producing 80,000 additional tonnes of beef for international markets. This would be a 20% increase. While I acknowledge that this would come mainly from the dairy sector, I note that farmers out there are losing money at the moment. This is really saying to them that they need to produce more or lose more money. That is how they see it. The vast majority of farmers in that position are concerned that if production increases even more it will depress prices even more. I would like the Meat Industry Ireland representatives to deal with that issue.

The other issue, which concerns both groups, concerns the international marketability of Irish beef and its uniqueness. I have mentioned this here before. I am always going on about the family farm and the grass-fed system, that is, the unique selling points of Irish beef. In my view we are not getting anything like the potential return on that. For cattle prices to reach just 107% of the average EU price is quite frankly ridiculous, given the product we supply. We should be receiving 140% of the EU average. That is what we should be targeting. People in the meat industry tell me that is not possible right now in the context of the international markets we work in. Maybe it is not. How do we put ourselves into a position where it is possible? At some point somebody decided that Parma ham would get the highest price in the world. A group of people sat down somewhere and worked out how they were going to achieve that. Public representatives, people from the farming community and people from the meat industry all have a job to do. Irish beef is a prime product. We must get it sold as a luxury product, at the highest price possible. It may mean reducing productivity for a while and then building it up again when we create the demand for a luxury product, into which I believe we can turn Irish beef. Doing that will require the co-operation of everybody. That is the challenge for everyone. People talk about cartels and all of that. We are where we are with regard to the meat factories. The meat factories are corporations and they have boards. The job of those boards is to show a better return for their shareholders every quarter. We must argue that the best way to give those shareholders a better return, not in one quarter but in ten quarters' time, is to come up with a strategy which puts Irish beef at a premium in the world market. We all have to work together to achieve that.

The witnesses fully acknowledged that more has to be done. We should not let the opportunity presented by this crisis go. We should use this crisis to put the Irish beef sector into a new place. I understand that today we are primarily talking about suckler beef. We also have to acknowledge that beef will always come from the dairy herd. That beef also has a value. We need to work out a solution for that too. We all need to collaborate to do that.

Meat Industry Ireland's submission acknowledged that the Irish grass-based system has a unique advantage. So it has. Quite frankly we are not taking advantage of that uniqueness to anywhere near the degree that we should. A couple of weeks ago I spoke to a farmer in Leitrim raising suckler cows. He said to me that he was cutting back and would have less than half of his current number next year. He said that he was getting a few bob from the single farm payment. He saw no point in enduring the hardship of rearing calves and weanlings and getting them to market only to sell them for half price. That is the way he saw it. We need to provide an income for these people. The whole industry must work together to do that.

I have raised a question about Brexit several times in this committee. Let us suppose there is a crash-out Brexit or restrictions or high tariffs are put in place for processed beef going into the British market. The meat industry in Ireland also owns processing plants across the water. Rather than bringing the meat across, might the meat industry buy the cattle, bring them across and process them over there, paying the tariff on the animal rather than the finished product? That question has been put to me by several people. Farmers are worrying. They foresee that scenario. The Meat Industry Ireland submission referred to towns with meat processing plants and the impact these plants have on the economy. People in those towns are concerned that Brexit could deliver that double problem for them.

Finally I refer to the rules imposed by the industry; the four-movement rule, the 70-day retention period and so on. We are always told that the supermarkets and the people to whom the industry sells the product impose those conditions. If that is the case, we need to make them recognise the absurdity of it.

Anyone who knows anything about it realises that most calves are born in the springtime. Some 30 months later, their best before date is up, and the farmer has little option but to take what he or she can get for them. When they go over 30 months what they get is going to go down. There is a problem there that needs to be acknowledged. If it is the case that they are coming back with that, then we need to work out how to work with them to change that. It has to change, because it does not work for the farmer or for anyone else concerned. I thank the Chairman.