Farmers group does not accept idea of ‘managed decline’ in herds

Denis Drennan says farmers must ask politicians about their stance on the issue ahead of the local and European elections. Picture: Dylan Vaughan.

Farming representatives have hit out at confusing messages coming from Government, after the Taoiseach claimed that the national herd will not be reduced.

In ruling out a reduction in cattle, Simon Harris also suggested that brewers are never asked to reduce the amount of beer they produce, but the size of the national herd is constantly under scrutiny.

However, the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association has now criticised the remarks.

It claims that changes to regulations have already led to farmers cutting back on stock numbers.

Responding to comments made to the Irish Examiner, in which Mr Harris stated that “there’s no cut to the national herd”, the association’s president, Denis Drennan, said that it is becoming increasingly difficult to work out the Government’s position on this vital question.

“The national herd is being reduced, and it’s being reduced as a result of Government policy,” he said.

The Taoiseach might be correct in that there was no formal announcement, but quite deliberate changes to regulations and the official tolerance of low prices and low margins is having the same reducing effect

“So actually, they don’t have to formally announce reducing the national herd as a standalone policy,” Mr Drennan said, pointing to changes to the nitrates derogation.

Central Statistics Office figures show that, while the number of dairy cows rose by 500 last year, the total number of cattle dropped by 25,900 to just over 6.5m at the end of last year.

Mr Drennan said that the thousands of affected farmers had the right to have the Government announce a single transparent policy, and not have already stressed financial and farming positions added to by governing parties contradicting each other in public statements.

At a Fine Gael farming event in Kildare this week, Mr Harris said: “Farming isn’t — and sometimes it’s seen by some people as kind of — a kind of discretionary extra. It’s a core part of the Irish economy.”

Speaking just hours after he attended a decarbonization funding announcement at St James’s Gate, Mr Harris added: “There was no one in Diageo this morning saying: ‘Should we cut back on the beer?’

“They’re saying: 'How do we do it in an environmentally sustainable way?' That’s the same approach that we need to take to farming.

I would note, when you’re actually looking at emissions and emission reductions, agriculture is a sector making relative progress compared to other sectors of the economy

Mr Drennan said that, ahead of the local and EU elections, it is “imperative for all politicians ... to announce their positions on whether they believed that the national herd should: (A) be reduced at all; and (B) by what means.”

He said farmers want the debate to move past “vague expressions of support and posturing”, and the association is now asking every farmer voter to take the opportunity to ask each candidate their position on the question of this reduction of the national herd.

“[The association] does not accept this idea of ‘managed decline’ for one second. We believe that the sector, and the families on which it’s based, should be supported, and that the sustainability ambitions that we all share can be achieved in a way that builds this world-leading Irish sector,” he said.