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Martin wades into abortion debateAs the Dáil committee hearings continue on the abortion bill, Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin has waded into the debate saying it is important that Christian believers "be, and seen to be, on the side of life, especially when life is most vulnerable".
Payment cuts see families pay rent shortfallLimits on rent supplement payments set by the Government are forcing thousands of families to make undeclared top-up payments to landlords to secure places to live.
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Anger as North Korea launches another missileNorth Korea fired a short-range missile from its east coast, a day after launching three more of these missiles, a South Korean news agency said.
How Star Trek predicted the futureWHEN Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry first dreamed up the concept of a television show based in the unexplored universe of Outer Space in 1964, the world was a very different place.
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Warnings over future of eurozoneThe eurozone is heading towards a break up unless there are moves towards much closer political and fiscal union, according to chief economist with State Street Global Advisers, Chris Probyn.
Bruton defends corporate tax rateIreland will be able to maintain its current corporation tax code in the face of international pressure to prevent multinational corporations avoid paying their fare share of tax, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton said yesterday.
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Mayo’s statement of intentGalway 0-11 Mayo 4-16 Five minutes to go in Salthill yesterday and James Horan was still cajoling his men to sew it into Galway.
Wilkinson inspires Toulon to gloryASM Clermont Auvergne 15 Toulon 16 Not for the first time this season, a matchday performance and the result have made a mockery of the statistics.
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Glanbia and Cork co-ops under pressure to support milk prices
By Stephen Cadogan
Glanbia and the Co Cork dairy co-ops have come under intense pressure from farmers to support milk prices.
IFA National Dairy Committee chairman Kevin Kiersey has asked Glanbia, which cut its April milk price by 3c/l and its May milk price by a further 2.5c/l, to announce an end to milk price cuts for 2012.He accused the country’s largest milk processor of inflicting a major financial blow to suppliers, which will make the kind of on-farm investment necessary for expected post-2015 expansion nigh on impossible.
He said members of the IFA national dairy committee are lobbying co-ops countrywide to hold their May milk prices.
ICMSA deputy president Pat McCormack made a special appeal to Co Cork dairy co-ops to maintain their record of paying the leading milk prices. He accused co-ops of being much faster to act when prices are falling, compared to when milk prices are is rising.
However, dairy market analysts at Rabobank have cautioned against expectations of a sustained recovery in dairy prices, despite the 13.5% price increase in last week’s Fonterra global DairyTrade auction. Analysts said the global market is taking time to digest the additional dairy production volumes from a period of bumper output, led by New Zealand’s 11.5% production rise for the first three months of 2012.
Southern hemisphere producers such as New Zealand have entered their lower-output winter months, and EU and US milk flows have reached or recently passed their seasonal peak, said Rabobank analysts.
But they pointed to inventories building in the northern hemisphere, including nearly 80,000 tonnes of butter offered to an EU-assisted storage programme — up nearly 30,000 tonnes year-on-year.
“It is likely to take a few months before markets balance,” they warned.