While Minister McConalogue is leading an agri food focused trade mission to China this week, his colleague, Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Simon Coveney, is leading a mission to New York and Boston in the US.

The US is Ireland’s biggest export market at €5.5bn in 2022 for Enterprise Ireland (EI) companies.

The US is a major success for Irish exports, with 900 Irish-owned companies doing business there and almost three-quarters of these have a physical presence in the market.

Irish dairy companies are among these, as this is the single agri-food sector that has made a significant impact on the US market.

Bord Bia figures show that in the first two months of this year, volumes of Irish dairy exports to North America increased by over 5,000t to 12,541t, with most of these to the US market.

In 2022, the value of Irish dairy exports to the US was €676.4m, with butter, casein and infant formula the main products.

Drinks sales to the US in 2022 were €827m.

A food FDI meeting is identified by Enterprise Ireland as a key highlight of the trade mission, and no doubt the dairy sector will look to build on its strong start to the year for exports – as will the drinks sector.

However, that is about it for Irish farmers, with the other priority sectors for EI companies including financial software, life sciences, telecommunications, tech solutions, digital media, oil and gas, international education, cleantech and consumer goods.

Beef and sheep meat

While the US is a key market for Irish dairy, the same cannot be said for beef – and sheepmeat exports have yet to get going despite the agreement of a veterinary certificate being announced over a year ago.

Back in February 2015, Minister Coveney was Minister for Agriculture, and he led a high-profile launch of Irish beef on to the US market. It was a slow start because the product being offered, steak meat, was not what the US was buying.

At that time, they were the biggest beef importer in the world, but it was manufacturing beef for use in burgers and the hospitality sector, and Ireland didn’t have approval for that until much later.

Irish beef sales in the US were making some progress in 2020 and 2021, but fell back in 2022 and have completely flopped so far this year.

In the first two months of 2021, Bord Bia figures show 1,462t exported, but this has collapsed to just 126t. USDA data to the end of last week shows imports from Ireland this year at 732t compared with 2,331t in the same period last year.

While beef exports to the US have been disappointing, sheepmeat exports have failed to start, even though a veterinary certificate agreement was announced by Minister McConalogue over a year ago.

Technical issues remain and Irish exports remain blocked to an 80,000t market, the largest in the world after China, with 98% supplied by Australia and New Zealand.

Comment

In the simplest terms, the US can be classified as a success for Irish dairy exports and a failure so far for beef and sheepmeat.

However, Irish dairy is now a long-established competitor in global markets whereas the EU, and up to this point the UK, have been relatively protected markets for beef and sheepmeat.

The UK and EU have consistently been the market for over 90% of Irish beef exports and almost all sheepmeat exports.

These have been more commercially lucrative than the US and have underpinned a relatively strong performance in Irish farmgate cattle and sheep prices over the past two years.

The US has long-established supply lines that can only be broken into with a relatively cheap offering, and that market for beef has been captured over the past two years by Brazil. Sheepmeat may have some potential when access finally happens.

However, the mission to China represents the best prospect for a new market for Irish beef exports, as its demand for beef imports continues to increase year on year.