Bullish on beef: Michael O’Leary’s views on expansion, star ratings, and Trump

"We now buy in almost no meal. We feed the cattle mainly on a mix of silage and wholecrop, and I think that diet has probably helped significantly to improve the quality of the animals too."

Known for his no-nonsense approach to aviation, Ryanair boss Michael O’Leary has ambitious expansion plans for his agricultural venture.

“We’re not playing at farming,” O’Leary states bluntly, as he explains his ambitions to increase winter cattle capacity to 1,000, with two new sheds under construction and recent land acquisitions.

Over the last year, he has bought an extra 350 acres, which he says now takes him up to 2,000 acres.

“It allows us to have much more tillage, and I’m about to break ground on two new cattle sheds going in this summer.

“Currently, we can overwinter 600 cattle, and we’re going to increase that now to be able to winter 1,000 cattle,” he told the Irish Examiner.

This latest expansion is part of a broader vision — not just in terms of scale, but of sustainability.

Scaling up, closing the loop

“We’re moving towards a more circular, self-sustaining operation,” he said, explaining that he plans on reducing reliance on external feed inputs and maximising land productivity.

“We now buy in almost no meal. We feed the cattle mainly on a mix of silage and wholecrop, and I think that diet has probably helped significantly to improve the quality of the animals too.

“I need 2,000 acres of land so I can spread the FYM [farmyard manure] and the slurry. So, it is getting to be more and more circular and sustainable, financially sustainable too, which is ultimately where I want it to go.”

Sale highlights

His 2025 sale line-up includes 25 bulls and 20 heifers. Particularly exciting lots this year include two red Angus and the first of O’Leary’s famed Shadwell progeny to make it to the sale.

They include two Shadwell-bred bulls, Lot 2, Gigginstown BlackShadwell Z753, with a Dairy Beef value of €131, and Lot 25, Gigginstown BlackShadwell Z853, who has a Dairy Beef value of €120, and a heifer listed in Lot 39, Gigginstown Rose Erica Z800, out of from Shadwell Rosa Erica V135.

The opportunity to purchase the Shadwell cattle came up in May 2022 following the untimely passing of Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum in 2021. The legendary Shadwell Aberdeen Angus Herd offered Angus breeders the opportunity to buy foundation females from one of England’s most-renowned and successful AA herds, and now for the first time Shadwell has bred numerous AA National Champions, as well as many interbreed champions across several of the UK’s biggest shows.

At the time, O’Leary said he felt it was a “once in a generation opportunity”.

Herdsman Joe O’Mahony successfully purchased 21 of the 94 cattle on sale, including Shadwell’s young Stock Bull (and Perth champion), Stouphill Master Prince W346 (born 2020), who is still in use at Gigginstown House, as well as three champion in-calf heifers Shadwell Black Bird (cost £11,506), Shadwell Evora (£15,750) and Shadwell Lady Heather (£12,600).

The 21 pedigrees were purchased for €170,000 — an average of over €8,400 each.

Breeding for quality, not bureaucracy

Despite some of the recent furore over them, O’Leary has opted to include ICBF star ratings in this year’s catalogue, but says that the changes in recent months are “bureaucratic nonsense” that undermine the scheme’s own credibility.

“We’ve all been working to the same star race for the last five years, and then the last 12 months, some bureaucrat in the stroke of a pen changes all the star ratings. They will undermine the credibility of the whole system if they keep chopping and changing it,” he said. “It’s very frustrating. I’ve now bought animals that have one-star ratings, but two years ago, they had four-star ratings. I have some animals who, two years ago, had three-star ratings and now have five-star ratings.

“I think it is very important that we have kind of stability in those over a long number of years, five or 10 years, and then people will get used to them.

“We’re going to produce what we think, visually, is a quality animal. We want them to grade out at E or U. We don’t want any Os or Ps, and therefore, what we’ll breed towards that with long-term view, with a view towards delivering long-term quality and premium.”

But despite the challenges facing breeders, O’Leary is certainly feeling bullish about the beef sector.

“For the first time in years, beef farmers might actually make a reasonable living,” he notes, pointing to recent price improvements and a growing market appreciation for premium beef”.

However, he cautions against complacency.

“I think for the next year or two, [the market] will be strong. Then, I think the market adjusts. The herd sizes will begin to grow again. Because beef prices are rising, people invest more in producing beef,” he said.

“This idea that somehow, because the greens are worried about them, we should reduce the herd sizes was always, in my view, nonsense. We should increase the herd sizes. We have a huge advantage in food production, particularly beef production, in Ireland.”

Still, he questions whether breed premiums — including the bonus paid for Angus — will hold.

“I think there is a risk the factories will say, ‘Listen, you’re all getting a premium now, go away’,” he said.

“But I wouldn’t like to see the price of beef run any higher. I think we need to get the herd size, national herd size up again, so that we improve supply and maybe prices will level out a bit.

“We don’t want to price beef out of the market. We have to produce something that the consumer can afford — there needs to be a balanced struck between the farmer, poor farmer, getting in reasonable return or living out of farming, and also not screwing the consumer.”

Trump

On the subject of sudden and erratic changes, what does he make of the tariff wars erupting this week between the US and the rest of the world?

“Trump is doing what Trump always does. He’s just dominating the news agenda,” O’Leary said, correctly predicting the 20% tariff. “Others will respond, like he’ll change his mind by Friday anyway.

“They don’t really have a coherent plan in the new administration in America. They’ll make announcements, and then they reverse the announcements before the week is out.

“So there’s certainly no great economic or political kind of strategy behind what’s going on. The rest of the world will just deal with it. From my point of view, we were very worried Boeing would be hit with tariffs. Trump is just Trump. There will be lots of these announcements and lots of news flow. He likes dominating the news agenda.

“But ultimately, if he does introduce 20% tariffs, the first people to feel this will be Walmart customers across America. These are lower labour cost economies that produce the bought-in goods for Walmart at a fraction of the price at which they can be produced in North America.

“Ultimately, the US has been the biggest beneficiary of free trade because they’re the biggest consumer of goods and services.”

• The Gigginstown House sale takes place on Saturday, April 19, at 1pm sharp, on Fennor Farm, Co Westmeath (N91 K026).