A written response from a senior Tesco executive to queries raised by Irish MEPs Mairead McGuinness and Jim Nicholson has caused a setback in the potential for more cattle to move from the Republic of Ireland to Northern Ireland (NI) for either finishing or direct slaughter (so-called nomad beef).

The Irish Farmers Journal understands that representatives from Foyle Food Group (which owns slaughtering sites on both sides of the border and has Tesco as its major retail customer) had been working quietly behind the scenes to get some of this nomad beef on to retail shelves in Britain.

Problem

It was an attempt to solve a problem that came to the fore after the horsemeat debacle when British retailers tightened their beef specifications and demanded only British or Irish origin cattle, not a mix of the two.

The horsemeat scandal also put British (and NI) beef prices well ahead of prices in Europe, which had previously been a possible outlet for this nomad beef.

The business was about to get going after the North’s Agriculture Minister Michelle O’Neill approved a label last week that would allow the nomad beef to carry an Irish identity. There is no question that the beef would have been fully compliant with EU beef labelling rules.

However, the potential new business has now stalled after the content of the letter to McGuinness and Nicholson was made public, putting an unwanted spotlight firmly on Tesco.

In it, the retailer said that it would not be selling beef that crossed two jurisdictions (i.e. nomads) as it was too confusing for consumers. Sources maintain the letter was dated 10 August 2014, a week before the new Irish label was approved.

While the letter outlined the position of Tesco at the time, the issue had moved on in the past week. At the level where suppliers and buyers interact, there has been significant progress made. It is a bottom-up rather than top-down approach. Instead of the issue being sorted in a matter of days, it could now take considerably longer to modify the thinking of British retailers.