High farm input costs, poor weather conditions and in some cases disappointing prices on returns means that Budget 2025 today (Tuesday, October 1 ) is especially important for farm families.
But what are farmers hoping that Budget 2025 will deliver for them? Agriland was out and about at a cattle sale at Tullow Mart to hear what’s on their minds.
Farmers told Agriland that it has been a difficult couple of years particularly in relation to raising sucklers.
But costs are an underlying factor for all systems and many farmers said they do not feel that the government is putting the right financial supports in place.
Whether it is improved payments for the suckler sector or incentivising tillage farmers to help them get a “decent return from the tillage crop” there is a demand for government to do more.
Farmers also pointed to increases across the board from fertiliser to meal prices and bedding as constant challenges for them.
In addition to this some highlighted that when it comes to environmental schemes there are a lot demands on farmers in comparison to the financial supports available.
Budget 2025
According to Eric Driver, manager of Tullow Mart, the general consensus is that “government needs to look back to agriculture, they seem to have forgot it and walked away from it a little bit”.
Driver believes that it has been proven that agriculture is the “backbone of the country”.
“I do hope the Minister for Agriculture has listened to what the farmers have been saying to him, they have made their voice very clear and it is important now that the budget stands by them,” he said.
The leaders of the largest farming organisations have delivered stark warnings to the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Charlie McConalogue, in the run up to the budget today setting out to him that it must support farmers’ incomes.
The president of the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA), Francie Gorman, told the minister that “farmers, across all sectors, need greater support than ever to provide a shelter for families and farm operations”.
While the president of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association (ICMSA), Denis Drennan, highlighted to him that “the farm and wider agri sector had undergone a collapse both in terms of farmer income and overall value in the last three years”.
The president of the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers’ Association (ICSA), Sean McNamara, also told Minister McConalogue to “stop the decimation of vital farming sectors and preserve the fabric of rural Ireland by delivering for low-income beef, sheep, and suckler farmers in Budget 2025”.
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