Fianna Fáil senator in Co. Clare, Timmy Dooley, has called for the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC) to intervene in the ongoing dispute between knackeries and rendering plants that is having “severe negative impacts on farmers”.
Knackery collection services and renderers have been at an impasse across the country since the start of December, leaving farmers with fallen animals without a collection service.
Sources in the knackery sector previously told Agriland that rendering plants in the Republic of Ireland have stopped accepting material from knackeries for rendering.
It is claimed that this is due to the knackeries’ inability to pay the cost of rendering, which increased a number of months ago.
Senator Dooley said: “We now have a situation where, due to an increase in costs for rendering services, all four rendering plants in Ireland have banded together and downed tools, effectively holding the state and farmers to ransom.
“Rendering is the most environmentally sound way to manage bio-waste. Perishable material produced by agriculture, meat processing, the food industry and the catering industry is recycled and turned into a high-value product used by industry and energy production.
“With rendering plants now refusing to take carcasses, farmers have been left as the victims with no direction on how to manage fallen animals and carcasses.”
The senator has now urged the CCPC to urgently intervene in the dispute and bring together rendering plants, knackeries, farm organIsitions and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) to find a solution.
“This has now gone too far, with farmers being left in extreme difficulty while knackeries are full and we face into the winter period where the potential is there for even more farm animals to die. A solution must be found,” Senator Dooley said.
Last week, Fine Gael senator Timmy Dolley told the Seanad:
“We have a build-up of fallen animals in rural Ireland. I spoke to individuals in west Cork earlier about the fact that more than 35 calls were made to one knackery.
“The owner does not have the ability to go out and pick these animals up because he has no place to take them,” he said.
Agriland has contacted the DAFM on numerous occasions for a response to the current situation which is now creating welfare issues on some farms across the country, but the department has not offered any response towards a resolution.