Beet growers pessimistic over future of trade
Anthony Collins, who farms in Mogeely, in the tillage heartland of east Cork, fears the worst and has cancelled an order for a new tractor.
But while he is pessimistic, he also makes it clear he does not want to see Ireland throwing in the towel on an industry that has played a vital role in the economy of rural Ireland for generations.
“It is worth fighting for,” he said, stressing that Irish beet growers are more efficient than reports indicate.
Mr Collins, who has been growing beet since 1963, said it appears the EU wants to ‘take out’ the countries that in its opinion are the least efficient sugar producers.
Mr Collins said 80,000 acres of beet are grown in Ireland. If all the beet on that acreage was processed, he says, it would be far in excess of the country’s near 200,000 tonne sugar quota. The surplus beet is, therefore, fed to livestock.
He said Ireland’s position should be to negotiate the best possible deal and in no way should it relinquish its sugar industry.
Growers in the midlands, who supplied the now- closed Carlow factory and face the prospect of sending their beet to Mallow, are even more pessimistic - they say they want to get out of the industry altogether and to seek as much compensation as possible.
John Lowry, chairman, Midland Beet Growers, called a meeting of growers in Carlow last week in light of the leaked EU reform proposals.
PRO Martin Healy said the unanimous response of the growers was to opt out of beet growing, maximise the value of their quota and go for a buy-out scheme.
“We are dedicated sugar beet growers and we want to grow beet. We want to continue growing beet, but the proposals on the table from Brussels makes it uneconomic,” he said.
The cuts would reduce the price paid to Irish growers to €25 per tonne of sugar beet from the current €47 per tonne, he said, rendering production “totally uneconomic”.
