Cattle

  • There is a total of 7.2m cattle in Ireland, situated on 109,400 farms. The average herd size is 66 cattle.
  • Over 60% of this cattle population is located on 52,000 farms in the southeast of Ireland; here the average herd size rises 12 to 87 cattle.
  • There are smaller herd sizes near the border, in the west and throughout the midlands, with 47 being the average cattle herd size in 2016.
  • There are 1.4m dairy cows in the country and almost four-fifths of these are based in the southeast.

    • Sheep

  • A total of 5.1m sheep was recorded in 2016. Held on 36,000 farms, the average flock size was 140 sheep per farm.
  • One-quarter of the national flock was located in the west (just over 1.4m).

    • Pigs

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  • In 2016, there were more pigs in Ireland than dairy cows, with 1.6m pigs based on 1,300 farms. One-third of these pigs were situated on the border (481,900).
  • The midlands had the largest average number of pigs per farm at 2,833.

    • Poultry

  • There were more than 11m poultry in Ireland in 2016, the vast majority of which (71.6%), were in the border, midlands and western region.
  • Average flock size in the border, midlands and western region (1,760 birds per farm on average) was more than double that than in the southeast region (681 birds per farm on average).
  • Both pig and poultry farming continued to be an intensive activity carried out by a small numbers of specialised producers.

    • Read more

    Reduction in specialist beef producers – CSO