“Based on reports from the market, current price levels, while disappointing compared to recent years, are very much reflective of the prevailing trading conditions,”said director of Meat Industry Ireland (MII) Cormac Healy in response to comments from the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association (ICSA) on current lamb prices and carcase weight limits. “Processors have indicated that, in recent weeks, they have seen a dramatic increase in volumes of very heavy lambs which simply don’t meet market requirements.”

Numbers of lower-priced UK lamb in the system, the first Lacaune lamb reaching the market in France and a significantly weaker skin and fifth-quarter return compared with this time last year are all pushing prices down, he said.

“Processors are seeing a lot more lambs of excessive weight and fat cover and this creates a real problem in the marketplace. This, no doubt, is due to the favourable weather conditions over recent weeks which has seen very good thrive, but is also due to stock being carried over instead of being slaughtered before Christmas. No matter what, it is important to market lambs as they come fit.”

Protest

The sheep committee of the ICSA staged a protest outside the Irish Country Meats (ICM) plant in Navan, Co Meath, last Friday. It came on the back of claims from sheep committee chair John Brooks that “factories are purposely keeping quotes down at €4.75 and imposing even tighter weight limits”. Brooks said farmers “are losing money due to some unscrupulous practices by processors and this can no longer be tolerated”.

The one hour-long protest took place outside the gates of ICM and was made up of 15 members of the ICSA sheep committee. Protestors were quick to raise their boards to incoming and outgoing farmers to highlight what their campaigning was about.

“We need to get back to at least €5.50/kg and the weight limit can’t be any less than 24kg,” said Paul Brady from Co Cavan. “We are 70c/kg down on last year and we are only getting paid up to 23kg – that’s €16/ head.”

Fair play

When asked what they hoped to achieve by protesting, “fair play” was the common response among farmers. They criticised recent statements from processors who are claiming to need one million extra lambs this year. “This small increase in supply will scupper demand,” said Brooks. “We can’t sell the animals we have already, so increasing supply would mean saturating an already flooded market.”

Listen to an interview with ICSA sheep chair John Brooks in our podcast below:

Listen to “Sheep farmers' protest in Navan” on Spreaker.

Farmers also raised the issue of the new €10/head sheep payment, saying that the subsidy was only driving prices down further.

“If you’re going to give us €10 per animal, why give someone the tools to take €20 off us,” said Co Meath sheep and suckler farmer Jimmy Cosgrave.

Future

Finally, farmers raised concerns over the effect of the current low prices on future prices in the back-end of the year. Kieran Farrell, an organic sheep farmer from Co Roscommon, asked: “Who is going to buy stores next year if they can’t get a good turnover from their lambs now?”

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Sheep prices: hogget factory trade remains dull