Rural Ireland is “being squeezed and squeezed – and not getting the return for what’s being done”, according to farmers who attended the Irish Farmers’ Association’s (IFA’s) regional online meeting on the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) last week.
On Wednesday evening (May 19) the IFA held its regional online meeting for South Leinster.
Chaired by South Leinster regional chairman Francie Gorman, the meeting included talks from IFA president Tim Cullinan and a presentation outlining the organisation’s six key CAP demands, presented by IFA chief economist Tadhg Buckley.
During the question and answer session afterwards, Carlow farmer – and former TD and chairman of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Agriculture – Pat Deering voiced his concerns around the latest direction of CAP, stating: “I think we’re travelling down a very dangerous road with CAP at the moment.
“Whether we like it or not, 650 million people go to bed hungry every night of the week. We in Ireland are a very efficient producer of food; we produce enough food to feed 50 million people.
“We’ve been contributing to that over the last number of years – and now we’re being asked to go away from that particular policy so somebody else is going to produce that food, somewhere in other parts of the world that are not nearly as efficient.
“We’ve had a 30% reduction in Pillar I payments in this particular proposal; in five or six years’ time whoever’s around, that figure will likely be 50 or 60%.
“We’re on a slippery slope at this moment in time and we need to say stop. If we don’t there will no one getting involved in farming in the next number of years,” the Carlow farmer warned.
“I think if it has to drag on beyond June, July and August, so be it, so long as a deal is done and done well so that we don’t suffer as a result.
It’s not just about farmers suffering – it’s about the whole of rural Ireland being squeezed and squeezed – and not getting the return for what’s being done.
Another farmer, James Hill, went a step further, telling Cullinan: “You introduced to a term ‘policy betrayal’; you couldn’t have chosen more apt words.
“As I see it, as a farm organisation we have showed a dereliction of duty to farmers. We have allowed all of this to take place. James Murphy asked the question ‘how did we get here?’
We got here because we allowed ideologues, we allowed politicians, we allowed green movements – all sorts of people that know nothing about the business of farming – to set the agenda.
“We weren’t out there with our line of defence – which was outlining where farmers sit in terms of the work they do, what they produce and the income they derive from it. That is essentially what this is all about.
“The potential income loss and the effects of the price inadequacy cost inflation vis-à-vis the income position of farmers given the work that they do has never, ever been highlighted,” Hill claimed.
“In times past in CAP reforms IFA led the parade in terms of information to policy makers. We were in constant contact through the department to our office in Brussels and we were well recognised for the quality of the information we put forward. We have no information to date.
“On the eco scheme I think the organisation has to make sure that whatever is lost through an eco-scheme will be returned to the farmer at a nil cost.
“Because my understanding is these eco-schemes will involve further involvement of Teagasc or consultants or somebody else that will all cost money – part of the income drain.
Responding to these views, IFA president Cullinan said: “We understand more than anyone the impact that this is having.
“We’ve been saying that since these eco-schemes came about; if we go back to our AGM in January we clearly told the Taoiseach that this was a cut; it was another 30% was being robbed or ripped out from farmers’ incomes – there’s no point in saying anything else. We have to look at it.
“Convergence was introduced in the last CAP reform in 2013 and we went to 60% here in Ireland; the plan was to go to 75% by 2025 – if we look at where we are in Europe, 19 countries have fully converged already.
“We’ve clearly said to our minister that he has to hold the line on the 75% and that’s where we’re at. If there’s only 34% of farmers viable at the moment, this is absolutely concerning.
“We produce enough food to feed 50 million people. That goes over to the climate debate as well; if we’re not going to produce it here it’s going to be produced somewhere else.
So that is a battle we’re in at the moment as well, to educate our politicians that this is the fact and this is what we’re dealing with.
The president stressed: “Farmers are doing a lot of environmental good as it is – we need to start and go from there.”
Turning to Hill’s point on the leakage of payments, Cullinan agreed, stating:
“The more consultants and advisors that are going to be in around this, that is going to cost money – and that is leakage.”
On another point he said: “What I’m hearing in Europe is Europe now wants a level playing field for the rest of the world around the environment and they want other states that are importing into Europe to come up to the level of the environmental ambition that Europe wants to come up to.
“If that was to happen it would prevent some of the cheaper produce from coming into Europe; and that is an argument for another day. Obviously we have to drive the price that we’re getting for our produce along with what we’re doing here as well.
“It’s important that we get the maximum funding out of this reform to compensate farmers,” the president concluded.