There is nothing as irritating as somebody giving a view on market conditions with the benefit of hindsight.

Nevertheless, I went back to my notes of 2 December of last year, when Teagasc held their Review of 2025 and outlook for 2026 conference.

They covered all the main areas with lots of caveats around the war in Ukraine and the carbon adjustment mechanism and its effect on fertiliser prices.

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At this stage of the year, their caution on prices was justified, especially in the dairy and cereals sector.

However, in the beef sector, they were very clear that their forecast was compiled in co-operation with Bord Bia, which has of course an important market intelligence function.

The forecast was very clear – an average factory price of €8/kg for 2026 could be expected.

Did this forecast give a sense of misplaced confidence to the sector?

The importance of the British market was rightly highlighted but no indication was given of the vulnerability of the UK market to third country imports, especially from Australia, with their increasingly free access to the UK market.

We seem to have forgotten that part of the Brexit deal between the UK and the EU was that UK-produced farm products would have in effect unrestricted access to the general EU market.

Up to now, these exports have been restricted because of the veterinary and phyto-sanitary regulations that have to be observed, but a key area in the current UK / EU discussions is that these be loosened up to allow easier access for British food exports to Europe.

As the trade deals covering New Zealand and Australia allow increased beef and lamb into Britain over the coming years, we will inevitably see domestic UK production diverted to Europe, and the UK market –by far the main market for Irish beef – increasingly exposed to unlimited imports from Australia.

We may have concerns about Mercosur but at least there is a cap on levy-free imports into the EU from South America, as well as an increased awareness of the difference in standards with regards to imports from Brazil.

The former Minister for Agriculture in the UK, Michael Gove, described Boris Johnson’s free trade deals in agriculture with Australia and New Zealand as selling British farmers down the river.

If we stand by and continue to allow UK farm output to look for freer access to Europe, we will in effect be turning back the clock to the pre-EU entry days when Britain was fed from its former colonies and Irish farmers competed with them with neither supports nor protection.

We have had a sample of what that could mean with this spring’s collapse in prices and farmer losses. Now is the time to put in place real safeguards with the Irish government and especially the department of agriculture keeping a close watch on the discussions between the European Commission and Britain, though it is extraordinary there is no examination of processor profitability.