Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Charlie McConalogue has today (Wednesday, December 13) said the first option for farmers with fallen animals should be to contact their animal collector who can take them to Northern Ireland to be rendered.
This situation arose following substantial increases to fees charged by renderers to animal collectors for the disposal of non-TSE tested fallen farm stock.
The minister said recent engagement by his department involved meetings with the Irish Category One Renderers Association (ICORA), where the department offered a generous increase to the subsidy paid for the benefit of farmers towards the rendering cost of fallen animals.
Minister McConalogue told Agriland that he has removed a previous 125km travel distance restriction that was in place, which specified the distance that animals for rendering could travel.
The minister said he had been “monitoring” the current dispute between knackeries and rendering plants and acknowledged that it had “got into a much more difficult situation now because it’s gone on for a week and a half”.
“It is a dispute between the renderers and the animal collectors and it’s a dispute in relation to the prices being charged there,” he said.
“I’ve had my team engaging with all of them to see if we can find a way forward and find to help to resolve it but it hasn’t been resolved yet.”
According to the minister the removal of the previous 125km travel restriction on transporting fallen animals for rendering is an important option for farmers.
“I have removed that so that animals anywhere now, for example, can go into Northern Ireland and renderers in Northern Ireland are accepting animals, so that is an option available at the moment and while this dispute is underway, many animals are going into the north,” he continued.
“That should be the first port of call for farmers who have a fallen animal; to contact their animal collector who does have that outlet in Northern Ireland to be able to actually get rendered while this dispute is ongoing,” Minister McConalogue added.
A guidance document outlining the requirements for dispatch to rendering plants in Northern Ireland has been sent to the Animal Collectors’ Association.
Fallen animals could be buried on farm
But the minister said that farmers who might not be in a position to get an animal collector to collect fallen animals at this time also have another option.
“It is going to be possible now to provide authorisation for (animals) to be buried on farm and farmers can contact their local department [of agriculture] office to get the appropriate authorisation to be able to bury on farm, if they don’t have any other option,” the minister added.
This requires a burial licence from DAFM and comes with strict environmental conditions. To obtain a licence, the herdkeeper must inform the local Regional Veterinary Office (RVO) of the department who will provide the information required.
“In the meantime I’m working and my team will continue to work to try and be helpful to reach a resolution to this dispute,” Minister McConalogue said.