Michael D'Arcy (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I listened to the debate this morning and more hares were raised here than one would see at a coursing meeting in Clonmel. I listened to Deputy Paul Murphy speaking about somatic cell count levels being a food safety issue. It is not a food safety issue, rather it is a quality issue. People who know about agriculture, particularly dairy farming, would know that.

It is important to recognise that there are challenges. The largest challenge by a country mile is that to farm incomes. The reality is that this challenge has been coming for quite some time. The largest aspect for anyone working as a farmer - be they large, small or in between - is the area they can affect as someone in business, namely, costs. I previously made the point that we have not done enough in respect of costs and milk is the best example. When the price of milk was high at 34 to 36 cent per litre a number of years, farmers spent too much. I made the point that when prices are high, we must put money aside for when world markets eventually level out. We are now at the low point in a trough. It is a real challenge and we do not do it enough. I am speaking as a commercial dairy farmer. To put it into context, 22 cent per litre at 4.5 litres in a gallon is €1 per gallon or less than 80 pence per gallon. My father was also a dairy farmer. In the late 1970s, it was over 80 pence a gallon so that is where commercial dairy farmers are trying to eke a living. Break even is about 25 cent per litre. At anything below that, one is producing at below cost.

There are things we can do with the support of this House, and I make a proposal relating to the milk quota bill from two years ago. A bill of €80 million is due to be paid in the next number of weeks in respect of people who went over quota. This money is paid by the State and there is an agreement between the co-operatives to levy that money from the dairy farmers who over supplied in that period. The sum of €80 million is to be repaid in the next three months and I propose that the payment of this money be deferred for two years and that it be paid in 2018. There would be no cost to the Exchequer. The money that is due to repaid will be repaid in two years and it would make €80 million that comes out of dairy farmers pockets available immediately. I hope officials will address this and I have spoken to the Minister about it.

Deputy Doyle is correct that TTIP is not the issue. Anybody would think that the US farming sector was producing nothing but poison. Hormones have been used for decades in the US. We do not agree with them here and they are illegal, but they are legal in the US and there is no proof of any negative impacts on people's health.

Beef is the nub of the issue for the farming sector. The producers producing weanlings are not getting enough. If they took the time they put in per hour, they would be working for practically nothing so they put their money in and get it out but they are not getting paid for their time, which is a ridiculous scenario for anybody in any business. The finishers are buying the animal at too high a price. When they finish and kill the animal in the factory, the animal is not producing enough money for them to have a margin. It all keeps coming back to having a margin or not. That is the real challenge.

There are a couple of positive developments. Glanbia has an agreement with the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund in respect of the development of funding, which is very positive. The genetic merit increase in the dairy herd is also very positive. I was critical of some of the hares raised earlier. Deputy Eamon Ryan has a good proposal relating to forestry that should be explored.

I say in response to Deputy Martin Kenny that we should stop pitting farmer against farmer. Every person who goes out to farm an acre of land does it in the best way he or she can. We should stop seeing it in terms of east versus west, big farmer versus small farmer. A farmer does not and should not look at his neighbour as a small farmer. Farmers are farmers, not big, small, east or west.

See this speech in context