The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) has told Agriland that farming organisations “want direction and resolutions” on challenges the sector is facing, ahead of a meeting with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar today (Wednesday, May 24).
The ICMSA is joining the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA), the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association (ICSA), the Irish Natura & Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) and Macra at government buildings to meet the Taoiseach this afternoon.
ICMSA deputy president, Dennis Drennan said that rural areas that depend on farming are “losing heart and worse, are losing trust” in the government’s commitment to “our biggest and indigenous economic engine and activity”.
According to Drennan urgent issues and challenges were “queued out the door, down the road and around the corner”.
Speaking in advance of today’s meeting, Drennan said that even veteran observers and commentators would struggle to remember a time where there were so many seemingly intractable questions to which it appeared so “little government attention had been devoted”.
“Whether it’s the most recent and suspicious furore over so-called food inflation and the disparity between domestic inputs and our competitors, or the ongoing dislocation and destruction that’s going to follow banding,” he said.
“Or the re-emergence of Mercosur, or the absolutely deliberate discrimination against dairy farmers we are seeing in things like the Fodder Scheme,
“The Irish government seems intent on walking one of the most sustainable farming and primary food-production systems in the world off a cliff.”
ICMSA on Nature Restoration Law
He was especially critical of the imminent Nature Restoration Law, which he said was “in danger of becoming a mass land confiscation”.
But according to Drennan, farmers were “well aware” of ongoing official land use reviews taking place all over the state and well outside land that would be deemed as reclaimed or marginal.
He said that farmers were “incredibly sceptical” about the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue’s claim that adherence to the Nature Restoration Law could be voluntary.
He continued saying an “absolute guarantee” is required now, well in advance and biding on future governments, that there will be no compulsory measures ordering farmers to “take their private property and means of livelihood” out of production.
“We are genuinely not sure that the government understands or appreciates the levels of downright panic that already exists and is growing daily due to their perceived indifference and poor communication of policy.
“Rural areas that depend on farming are losing heart – and worse, are losing trust – in the government’s commitment to our biggest indigenous economic engine and activity,” he added.