Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The EU-Mercosur trade deal is a sell-out of European agriculture. What makes it all the more galling is that it has been done by one of our own. When Ray MacSharry held the same agriculture portfolio, he framed CAP reform in a way that would suit Irish beef farming. Here we have a Commissioner framing a trade deal that will bring devastation to the agriculture industry. The production of beef, poultry, pigs, sugar beet and ethanol will be undermined by this trade deal. At a time when Brexit is heading to its conclusion and given that the European Union after Brexit will be 116% self-sufficient in beef production, it beggars belief that a deal such as this could be done to allow extra beef into the European market.

What is most galling for Irish farmers is the hypocrisy of the Commission on climate change. European food producers know that they must adapt to climate change. They know that it will bring extra production costs, but they were prepared to do this. They see the Commission enforcing all of these climate change restrictions on them, but then it does a deal that will hasten climate change on the planet. There is no way that addressing climate change is compatible with importing beef, poultry and pigs from halfway across the world to take the place of European produce. That is why such a large group of farmers were on the streets today. They find the hypocrisy of the Commission impossible to swallow.

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