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Up to 20 farmers attended an IFA-organised event in Munster about fodder shortages and rising meal costs, with the president of the organisation Joe Healy visiting three farms in the region to see first-hand how bad the situation was at farm level.
“The first point that was made to me as soon as I came in was we need to be able to get money to pay our bills, because everything that they’ve made all year from milk is gone on meal so far and trying to keep enough in reserve to buy silage,” Healy told the Irish Farmers Journal.
“And again that leads us back to the roll-out of low-cost loans and for the life of me I can’t understand how our Minister and this Government hasn’t grabbed that and dealt with it as a matter of priority.”
“It was announced in last year’s budget and we’re within a couple of weeks within this year’s budget here again and it’s still not rolled out.
“It’s disgraceful and it’s farcical and the Minister should be ashamed of himself and I would love if he was standing in the group that we were standing in here today and to hear how farmers are stuck for that money.
“That has to be treated as a matter of priority and get that money rolled out to farmers as soon as possible,” he said.
Healy and the IFA also visited farms in Wexford, Waterford and Kilkenny a number of weeks ago, as farms in that part of the country have also been suffering from the drought.
"The first drop of rain we saw since June was on the day of the All-Ireland hurling final" ?? farmers in Limerick talk to Joe Healy @IFAmedia about the fodder shortage after prolonged drought.
— Hannah QuinnMulligan (@hqmulligan) September 17, 2018
“I would say that here today there is more desperation than there was in the southeast and that was pretty bad two weeks ago,” said Healy.
“I do acknowledge the work the Department has done in relation to the flexibilities around certain measures in GLAS, the fertiliser application dates, the fodder import subsidy and also the catchcrop subsidy.
“They were all very welcome and needed, but more is needed and I think the Department and the Minister need to get out and visit groups around like we’re meeting here today just to see the depth of feeling that is so obvious out in that yard there.”
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