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Last week, I mentioned the challenges facing Irish agriculture over the next period. While none of them are insurmountable I was interested to receive a copy of the paper that Tom Arnold, chair of Ireland’s Agri-Food Strategy to 2030, recently wrote for the Journal for Cross Border Studies looking at agricultural and environmental policies for the island of Ireland in a post-Brexit world.
The first issue reached a crescendo in the British House of Commons on Monday night when the British government refused to put into law a guarantee that EU and present British food standards would be maintained
As might be expected, it is a thoughtful contribution to the subject but as he acknowledges, there are a number of issues outside the limited influence of Northern Ireland’s politicians and removed from any wishes the Dublin administration might have. The first issue reached a crescendo in the British House of Commons on Monday night when the British government refused to put into law a guarantee that EU and present British food standards would be maintained in any future trade deals that the British government might negotiate. The US is central here.
Coincidentally, at the same time as the House of Commons was debating the issue, the BBC was showing a highly critical programme on US agricultural practices.
The implications for British food prices and Irish market returns in a UK world free-trading environment are obvious
The feeding of hormones to beef cattle and clenbuterol to pigs were especially highlighted and, of course, chlorine-washed chickens – used because of the endemic presence of salmonella and other pathogens in the American poultry production system. The highly effective NFU president Minette Batters simply agreed that UK farmers could not compete with the production aids and for the first time that I had heard, the figures of beef costing over 20% less to produce and pigmeat over 30% less were given.
The implications for British food prices and Irish market returns in a UK world free-trading environment are obvious. In his paper, Tom Arnold echoes what former Taoiseach John Bruton said in a recent article in the Irish Farmers Journal, when he harked back to the economic war of the 1930s when tariffs applied to Irish cattle going to Britain and how that translated into falling prices and incomes. “The hope is that what lies ahead will not revive memories from that time.” The hope may be there but we have yet to see firm plans to prevent it from happening.
These are the future battlegrounds of policy debates
I was also fascinated to be told of the hugely higher pesticide residue limits applying to US crops than in the case of the EU. These are the future battlegrounds of policy debates and the resultant effect on farmer incomes.
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