The Irish Creamery Milk Supplier Association has said that the three additional beef plants approved for Chinese market “must result in better prices for farmers”.
In a statement made on the farmers' group’s website, Chairperson of ICMSA’s Livestock Committee Des Morrison welcomed the announcement.
The Right Results
He did, however, stress that unless the opening-up and development of the Chinese market resulted in a speedy and marked improvement in beef price to the farmer producers, that the whole project becomes “irrelevant and no more than a marketing exercise”.
Morrison noted that farmers were happy to recognise the “skill and dedication” of Ireland’s negotiators and the energy being brought to the problem of sourcing and winning new markets to offset the threat to our traditional British markets.
He highlighted that in previous situations where markets opened-up, any benefits from the market went exclusively to the exporting factories and no improvement in the prices paid to the people who produced the beef.
Morrison finished, “the actual benefit of the work done in opening up the Chinese market would and should only be judged in light of the positive results it brought to the farmers – not overall trade statistics or marketing reports.”
The ICMSA chairman made the announcement in response to news earlier in the week that the Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed has announced that a further three Irish beef plants and one pigmeat plant have now been approved by the Chinese authorities.
© 2018 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click subscribe to sign up for the Checkout print edition.
