‘EU sugar reforms will cripple growers’

Ray Ryan, Agribusiness Correspondent

IFA sugar beet section chairperson Jim O’Regan said it is outrageous and totally unacceptable that the leaked proposals would cut beet prices by 42.6% and put Irish beet growers out of business, while paying compensation to processors worth 120 per tonne of beet for closing sugar factories from July 2005.

Speaking before meeting with Agriculture and Food Minister Mary Coughlan, he said she must insist on a viable future for beet growing in Ireland, which is the cornerstone of the Irish tillage sector, and that means rolling back these unsustainable price cuts.