Many drystock farmers who were renting ground can no longer compete with premium prices of over €500/ac being paid by dairy farmers, a mid-Tipperary advisor has told the Irish Farmers Journal.“The dairy boys are blowing them out of the water and I’m seeing a lot of them sizing down [in numbers] as a result. They could afford to give up to €300/ac but not any more, their enterprises just can’t justify it. Dairy farmers will readily give €450/ac for land at the minute,” he said.
Many drystock farmers who were renting ground can no longer compete with premium prices of over €500/ac being paid by dairy farmers, a mid-Tipperary advisor has told the Irish Farmers Journal.
“The dairy boys are blowing them out of the water and I’m seeing a lot of them sizing down [in numbers] as a result. They could afford to give up to €300/ac but not any more, their enterprises just can’t justify it. Dairy farmers will readily give €450/ac for land at the minute,” he said.
Naked land, without any entitlements, is making between €350/ac and €450/ac over long-term leases, he said, while land with entitlements is making between €280/ac and €330/ac but the tenant must pay back Basic Income Support for Sustainability (BISS) money.
“There’s not an awful lot of land available, but dairy farmers are snatching up every acre they can get their hands on. Nitrates is obviously the big driver, as well as young farmer payments,” he said.
Premium prices
Land which cows can be walked to, that comes with a longer-term lease or has slurry storage, will make that premium price of over €500/ac, according to a Kanturk, Co Cork-based agricultural adviser.
He said that expansion on dairy farms has levelled off and dairy farmers are just trying to keep numbers at a standstill.
“The market is very hot because they’ve one eye on two years down the road.
“Farmers have made a lot of investments as regards infrastructure – they’ve built sheds, put in cubicles and none of them want to cut back cow numbers now.”
A north Kerry-based adviser said that competition between dairy farmers is extremely high.
“I’m in an area where there are 120,000 to 130,000 dairy cows and a lot of farmers are in derogation.
“These farmers are finding it very hard to get their hands on land. It’s just not being made anymore.
“We also aren’t as lucky as those in the east of the country, we don’t have any tillage farmers who want to take slurry off us and there’s no one around stocked low enough to take in slurry,” he said.
€620/ac
A total of €620/ac was given in a conacre lease for four acres of land in Conaghy, Co Kilkenny, last week, Kilkenny-based auctioneer Joe Coogan said.
Another conacre lease went for €480/ac in Jenkinstown, Co Kilkenny.
This is a subscriber-only article
SHARING OPTIONS: