Crucial beef sector worth more than €2bn to Irish economy

Why is our beef industry so important?

Ireland produces eight times more beef than it needs. That means 30 million people are fed with our exported products. We are the fourth biggest beef producer in the world.

This all results in an incredibly important industry worth more than €2bn a year to the Irish economy.

Despite a growing number of international customers, there is still a heavy reliance on supplying British tables. Britain accounts for more than half of all our beef exports — although continental Europe is a close second. This market is still recovering since the effect of the BSE scandal in the 1990s.

There are also emerging but still small amounts of business to Turkey, Russia, North Africa and the Middle East. Efforts have been made to develop a trade in China and boost exports to America. This is why the question marks now hanging over the Irish product have been so damaging, especially as large grocery chains opt to cancel contracts with the supplier at the centre of the horse DNA scandal — Silvercrest.

The food investment report produced by Grant Thornton this week noted McDonald’s sourced 20% of its beef for its European outlets from Ireland. But even this report recognised the potential impact of the latest food scare. “The recent issue with traces of imported horse DNA in beef burgers could translate into millions of euro lost for the industry,” it said.

While there are less than three dozen abattoirs approved for exporting meat, three big companies are responsible for almost two-thirds of the market.

These are Dawn, Kepak and the ABP group. Their accounts are not public but it is expected they account for more than €3bn in turnover between them.

The four smaller firms, which are responsible for the remainder of the trade, are Donegal Meats, Dunbia, Slaney and Liffey Meats.

Among the big three, ABP is easily the biggest.

One quarter of all cattle slaughtered in Ireland come through Larry Goodman’s ABP group. It has been, and remains, the biggest player in the European market. In Britain, it has expanded buying up plants and purchasing companies supplying the largest retailer in the market, Tesco.

ABP has doubled its capacity in Britain since 2010 to 600,000 cattle slaughtered per annum. That represents one in five cattle slaughtered in Britain.