Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) deputy president, Alice Doyle, is calling on the government to fully support the tillage sector, adding that this commitment must be made with immediate effect.
Doyle used her presentation to the recent 2024 Diageo / Boortmalt Irish Malting Barley Excellence Awards to highlight the disparities now impacting on tillage farmers.
These include the convergence of Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) payments, falling prices, ever tightening input costs and growers’ inability to compete with milk producers in securing land leasing agreements.
Recent developments
Doyle specifically recognised the commitments made by Diageo and Boortmalt to develop their respective operations in Ireland.
These developments will, in her opinion, lead to a further expansion of the malting barley industry at farm level.
“Irish farm families already produce 300,000t of malting barley on an annual basis. The overall growth of the brewing, malting and distilling sectors has been a real success story,” she said.
Doyle confirmed that the current pricing model for malting barley has worked well for growers.
“It has delivered premiums of between €65/t and €100/t over feed price over recent years, but it is important that a sustainable malting barley sector is retained in Ireland,” she continued.
This means ensuring that growers receive commensurate prices.
The deputy president continued: “Inflation has added significantly to the cost of doing business. Global grain prices are down by 60% since the heights of 2022.
“Despite falls over the last 12 months, fertiliser prices remain at historically high levels. At the same time, we also have high energy costs.
“The reality is that, €240/t for malting barley in 2024 does not stack up relative to what was the same price delivered back in 2018.”
Tillage sector
The IFA deputy president highlighted the challenges that confronted tillage farmers throughout 2023, culminating, for malting barley growers, with the highest level of rejection rates in living memory.
“As a consequence, many malting barley producers missed out on the premiums they had been counting on,” Doyle stated.
“This had significant financial knock-on effects for their businesses as a whole.”
She also referenced the impact that changes in the CAP are having on the tillage industry.
“Convergence of CAP payments has hit the tillage sector very badly. Similarly, changes to the nitrates derogation have created an explosion in land rental charges,” she said.
“With land rental costs now making up to €450/ac, we have an unfolding scenario within which tillage producers cannot compete with other farmers.”
According to Doyle, Ireland’s cropping area fell by 16,000ha in 2023. And she feels a further contraction is on the cards this year.
“Government must act to halt the decline in the tillage sector. And this support must be forthcoming in ways that will make a real difference for growers in 2024.”