Pressure on to suspend 2023 cow banding

Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue added that he is aware of the "real challenge" the banding presents for farmers.

Dairy farmers came out in force this week to put pressure on Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue to suspend the cow banding rates due to come into force in 2023 under new nitrates rules.

Speaking at the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association annual general meeting this week, president Pat McCormack said that the Department of Agriculture, along with farmers, are not ready for the cow banding.

He said some farmers are facing a significant reduction in herd size in 2024 unless it is abandoned.

From next year, under the Nitrates Action Programme, three new excretion rate bands are being introduced which will be calculated as 80kg per hectare, 92kg per hectare, and 106kg per hectare.

'A bridge too far'

Farmers in attendance at the meeting who posed questions to Mr McConalogue described the cow banding as “too narrow”, and there is “far more research needed before it is rolled out” as farmers fear the financial implications it may have.

One farmer said that while “we all know why” the banding is being introduced “and we fully understand that; unfortunately, your department has completely failed to deliver the methodology and the figures and the facts at farm level”.

Farmers criticised a lack of communication and raised concern that they are not aware of what band they will fall into, calling for a postponement of the banding’s introduction.

ICMSA deputy president Denis Drennan said that for many family farms, it is “going to be the difference between being in business and being out of business”.

“We’ve accepted loads of terms and conditions on good faith and that they work,” Mr Drennan said. However, he said the banding is a “bridge too far” for farmers to accept.

An interim review of the Nitrates Action Programme will take place in 2023 and, in addition, the conditionality attached to the European Commission’s extension of Ireland’s Nitrates Derogation requires a water quality review to take place in 2023.

Depending on the outcome of that review, derogation farmers in some areas of the country may be limited to a maximum stocking rate of 220kg organic nitrogen per hectare as opposed to the current limit of 250kg for derogation farmers.

Water quality

Mr McConalogue said that capacity to be able to farm up to 250kg of organic nitrogen per hectare as opposed to the standard which most other European countries are at of a maximum of 170kg is “really important for our sector”.

“But, it’s something that’s hard-earned and hard got, and that we have to negotiate at European level to be able to maintain it and indeed is something that doesn’t have widespread support across Europe either,” he said.

“It has come as well against the backdrop of some disimproving water quality over the last few years.

“It has meant there have been additional measures required of us by the European Commission in securing that derogation so, therefore, the banding is an aspect of it, it is required of us.”