Cobbled together in the middle of last year’s beef protests, the Beef Market Taskforce hasn’t delivered for farmers.

While Covid-19 can be blamed for the way the beef market currently is, the reality is that farmers aren’t in a better position now than they were 12 months ago, something the taskforce was set up to achieve.

A lot of discussion has taken place without a lot of answers. The lack of profitability in the sector, the lack of transparency at processor level and the lack of direction for farmers are still real issues.

IFA, Macra, ICMSA, ICSA, INHFA, ICOS and Beef Plan Movement representatives attended Thursday’s meeting along with representatives from Bord Bia, Teagasc, the Department of Agriculture and Food, Meat Industry Ireland and the major players in the Irish beef industry.

Talking shop

It has turned into another talking shop, with very little delivered for farmers so far. Weighing of animals prior to slaughter was held up as a serious issue by one farmer movement but has yet to be implemented at any factory. Factories have reported no demand for such a service and are reluctant to invest in the technology if there isn’t farmer demand. It has become a similar roundtable discussion to its predecessor, the beef forum, except without the meat factories and the Minister for Agriculture around the table, some might say two of the most important players in the industry.

Bord Bia figures

Bord Bia’s presentation makes for sobering reading. The meat marketing analytical firm GIRA predicts that beef consumption will drop by as far as 7-8%. European beef consumption has already been in a slow decline since 2019 and the most recent analysis predicts that this decline will accelerate in 2020.

Bord Bia had some positive news in that the most recent UK and Ireland retail figures look positive. Irish figures for the 12 weeks to 19 April 2020 show that beef volume sales are up 12.4% (mince +24.9%, steak +8.5%). While the increased retail sales won’t make up the deficit made by the closures in the food service trade, it’s still a positive to see more people making more purchases of beef in retail establishments.

In Britain, for the 12 weeks up to 19 April 2020, beef volume sales were up 16.2% (mince +27%, steak +10.8%) while in France for the 12 weeks to 22 March 2020 beef volume sales were up 8.7%.

Grant Thornton

Grant Thornton has kicked to touch twice now on reports due. Once due to unforeseen difficulty in attaining information from stakeholders, with the second delay being down to COVID-19. The three reports on competition within the sector, market requirements and an analysis of the total value of the animal along the supply chain are likely to yield very little, with processors citing commercial sensitivity as a way of holding back the data that is needed to make an assessment of where the industry is at.

PGI

The recent grass standard and proposed PGI application took apparently took up a lot of the discussion. It has turned into a charade since it was announced a few weeks ago. While the concept is a good one, and it’s good to see progress being made, the devil was always going to be in the detail.

Excluding bulls and including cull cows hasn’t gone down well with suckler farmers and it hasn’t gone down well with the IFA. The association maintains that farmers haven’t been consulted properly and questions remain as to who owns the premium and how farmers will be rewarded for it. What farmers don’t need is factories creating another pricing tier to use when buying stock. If a grass-fed premium is to be implemented, it needs to be fully transparent in terms of the level of premium that it achieves in the market and how this return gets its way back to farmers.