DEAR SIR:

I wish to take issue with comments made by Mike Magan, chair of Animal Health Ireland.

He stated in The Irish Times magazine dated 26 January 2019 that “we do need to consider what number of cows is appropriate.

Should they be uneconomic, inefficient beef cows or economic dairy cows?”

Irish beef cows are among the most efficient in the world in terms of producing beef based on quality, conformation and food conversion efficiency, and tend to be on a lot of the marginal, fragmented land in Ireland which would be abandoned without them.

Dairy cows on the other hand, while they may be efficient at producing milk, have totally undermined the beef industry with the massive increase of numbers since the ending of quotas and the ever-increasing production of cull cows and male calves which are neither efficient nor economic.

We have seen the effects this has had on the beef price in the past six months and it is something the dairy industry must address.

I am sick and tired of dairy farmers like Mike Magan making these type of comments about the beef herd and their promotion of monoculture. Beef farmers are not only dealing with drought, very poor prices, The Lancet reports and vegans, but are taking a constant bashing from some dairy farmers who are doing quite well as they undermine our industry.

The suckler herd is in serious decline and the issue needs to be addressed immediately.

Last Tuesday at the IFA AGM, Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed denied that there was a policy within the Department of Agriculture to drive down the number of suckler cows in the country.

I am saying for the minister to do nothing as the suckler numbers decline rapidly is in itself a policy to reduce the herd.

When the milk price collapsed a few years ago to 20c/l, the European Commission put large supports into intervention and also individual payouts of up to €3,000 per dairy farmer nationally to support the market.

We have seen no such supports for the beef industry this time around and what is worse I don’t hear any of the farm representatives looking for them.

I would challenge Mike Magan that Ireland has some of the best beef producers in the world and I think he would be better served by trying to deal with some of the major issues in his industry that I have outlined.

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