Beef farmers are being urged to “bargain hard” on prices, which “remain in the doldrums”, according to the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers’ Association (ICSA).
Edmund Graham, the association’s beef chairperson, told farmers not to accept €3.60/kg for steers and heifers.
“Prices are still languishing way behind where they should be. We had every expectation that prices would pick up significantly in the new year, but factories are continuing to torture beef farmers with the slow pace of progress,” Graham argued.
Factories are looking for cattle so the advice to farmers is to get tough on what they will accept.
He continued: “It beggars belief why the meat industry here is so hell-bent on dragging out any meaningful price increases and treating beef farmers with utter contempt, but that is what they are doing.”
Graham called for prices to increase to at least €4/kg in the short term.
“Farmers have been haemorrhaging money and for that to stop we need to see a more rapid rate of price increases,” he added.
With supplies not as plentiful as factories would have hoped for in January, the scope is there to bargain hard.
“30 months should also not be an issue, as most cattle are either well under at present or have gone past it already,” Graham pointed out.
Concluding, he said: “There is absolutely no justification for Irish beef prices remaining in the doldrums at a time when markets all over the globe are powering ahead, helped by demand from China for animal protein.”