The Chairperson of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association’s Livestock Committee has hinted at the possibility of a rise in the price of beef
Making the announcement, Des Morrison said that his organisation’s reading of the data points toward a “decent” rise in prices.
He said that the current differential between UK prices and Irish prices was “astonishing”, and suggested that it was evidence that Irish prices were being actively managed downwards.
However, Morrison noted that the throughput was going to challenge the factories ability to keep prices down.
“Throughput was down 4,829 head in the last two weeks of April and is actually down 1,441 to the end of April for the same period last year,” Morrison said.
“Even with the feedlots, the tightening in numbers is going to make a price rise inevitable and our opinion is that it might be a decent price rise,” he explained.
Continued Losses
The ICMSA Livestock Chairperson pointed out that last year prices rose steadily from the beginning of February.
This year he said that this kind of price rise is yet to happen, with the result being that farmers were down approximately €120 a head.
“This year the prices seem to have plateaued around €3.60c/kg, they’re up around €3.69c/kg just now, but that’s still a massive 30c/kg behind this time last year and it’s resulting in losses to the farmers of around €120 per head on an average steer,” Morrison said.
“We feel that between that, the price movement that usually occurs this time of the year, the tightening of throughput numbers, and the pressure that’s building on the factories to start realising the extent of the challenges facing the farmers, that a price rise is ‘in the system’ and may develop quite quickly as this month goes forward,” he added.
© 2019 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click sign-up to subscribe to Checkout.
