Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I move:

That Dáil Éireann:notes:

— the importance of agriculture as Ireland’s largest indigenous industry;

— that Article 39 of the Lisbon Treaty sets out the EU wide objective of ensuring a fair standard of living for farmers;

— the historic reduction in direct EU supports through the Common Agricultural Policy Pillar 1 with the single farm payment to Ireland reduced by €42 million per annum from €1.255 billion to €1.213 billion, approximately a 10% cut in real terms, with a further 14 per cent decrease in Pillar 2 payments;

— that the long-term sustainability of the agri-food industry in Ireland requires an adequate and fair market price return for farmers;

— that the ongoing manipulation of the market by big supermarkets and large processors is driving down prices for primary producers; and

— the need to ensure a level playing field between all actors in the agri-food industry, namely primary producers, processors and retailers with a fair return to each sector;

condemns the Government and the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine for failing to protect farmers from unfair treatment by retailers and processors; and

calls on the Government to:

— confirm its role and the remit of the EU under Article 39 of the Lisbon treaty in supporting Irish agriculture and establishing and overseeing a fair, effective framework for the market to operate within;

— ensure that the Minister emphasises the protection of farmers as the cornerstone of domestic and EU agricultural policy;

— work with EU Agriculture and Rural Development Commissioner-designate, Phil Hogan, to prioritise the re-balancing of power in the agri-food industry in order to ensure farmers get a fair, sustainable price for their produce;

— work, at an EU level, to ensure the objectives of Article 39 of the Lisbon treaty are fully achieved; and

— introduce a €200 per head beef genomics scheme payment in 2015 to support the vulnerable suckler cow sector.

We all recognise the right of all workers to get a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. Regardless of the industry, workers are entitled to make a decent standard of living from their hard work and effort, yet today in the Irish agricultural industry the primary producer in the food chain is being systematically undercut. The cornerstone of the industry, the family farm, is being whittled away by mounting pressure on price and market manipulation.

The ongoing beef crisis is a clear case in point. Some 80,000 dry-stock farmers are seeing their work and effort sapped by large processors and supermarkets. Interestingly, the Irish Farmers' Journallast week reported that a farmer in Ireland could expect to get €350 less than a farmer in Britain for the same-type animal. This is a toxic cocktail of short-term greed and Government indifference and it is destroying the basis of Irish agriculture.

My party introduced this Private Members' motion to highlight the increasing pressure that ordinary farmers are under across the country. Of course, this pressure has massive repercussions, not only for the Irish economy but for rural life and society. I am delighted to see here the Minister of State with responsibility for rural development, Deputy Ann Phelan, because I note, on the issue of the shape of rural society, it is not only about the economy. Often we talk about the society as if it was an economy but the economy is only a means to an end, in terms of creating a society that is a good place for people to live in. It is striking when one looks at the 1916 Proclamation, where there is interesting sentence which talks about pursuing "the happiness and prosperity" because they recognised that it was not all about economy. The economy was hugely important, prosperity was important, but so was the happiness of the people. In other words, the society that we are trying to create, which, in terms of Irish agriculture, is centred around the family farm rather than some corporate-type farming, is vital to rural society.

Agriculture is also our largest indigenous industry. On the agri-food sector, the Ministers' colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Tom Hayes, was in my village, Corr na Móna, today looking at the sawmill. Fair play to Deputy Kyne, he made it back quicker than I did. I had a bit of car trouble on the way back.

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