In 2020, a total of 81 livestock marts in the Republic of Ireland were registered with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM).
A report recently published by DAFM titled ‘Animal Identification and Movement (AIM) System Bovine Statistics Report 2020’ gives a county-by-county breakdown of all the livestock marts registered with the department for that year.
Marts by county
The table below gives a county-by-county breakdown of all the department registered livestock marts in Ireland in 2020.
As the table above indicates, Co. Galway has the most livestock marts with 10 cattle sales registered with the department in the county.
The county with the second highest number of marts is Kerry, with eight registered livestock sales.
Co. Tipperary has the third highest number of cattle marts, with seven registered marts in the county followed by Co. Donegal in fourth place, with six cattle marts registered.
In joint fifth place are Cavan, Clare, Cork and Leitrim, all with five registered marts in their respective counties.
The most suckler calves
In the report, DAFM also published a county-by-county breakdown on the number of suckler-bred calves born in each county across the Republic of Ireland in 2020.
For the purpose of the table, the beef calves were determined by the breed of dam.
The information was published in the DAFM’s Animal Identification and Movement (AIM) System Bovine Statistics Report for 2020.
The report contains useful data and statistical information which, according to DAFM, “is used by interested stakeholders to monitor trends in the beef and dairy sectors”.
The table below gives a county-by-county breakdown of the number of suckler-bred calves born in 2020.
The number of suckler-bred calves born in each county is given as a percentage of the total number of calves born in that county in the column on the right.
County Beef Calves % Beef calves Carlow 13,621 43.1% Cavan 40,761 51.3% Clare 66,232 66.2% Cork 65,061 14.7% Donegal 35,865 62.3% Dublin 3,094 58.4% Galway 91,789 70% Kerry 42,029 29.5% Kildare 15,354 45% Kilkenny 27,767 22.1% Laois 28,776 37.1% Leitrim 23,814 91.8% Limerick 30,948 20.8% Longford 22,977 69.1% Louth 10,256 35.6% Mayo 67,816 80.2% Meath 28,893 33% Monaghan 27,780 43.8% Offaly 26,863 44.2% Roscommon 46,347 85.3% Sligo 28,247 77.7% Tipperary 48,219 21.7% Waterford 17,275 16.8% Westmeath 31,535 52.4% Wexford 27,784 26% Wicklow 19,654 44.1% Total: 888,757 37.22%
As the chart above indicates, Galway is again the winner with the highest number of suckler calves last year, at 91,789 calves registered to a beef breed of dam.
Looking at percentages, just over 37% of all calves born in Ireland last year were progeny of suckler breeding, while the remainder of calves all came from the dairy herd.
Suckler bred calves accounted for 70% of all calves born in Galway last year.
Leitrim had the highest percentage of beef calves born at 91.8% followed by Roscommon at 85.3%.
A total of 888,757 calves were born in the Irish suckler herd last year.