Export market change - real and present

This week Bord Bia, the entity responsible for marketing Irish produce overseas, reported on the performance and trade figures for 2024.

It’s a timely reminder of the importance of exports to our island, particularly our farmers in rural Ireland. So what has changed in the last 10 years?

Overall meat and dairy products continue to dominate the value of trade. For all the talk of alternative produce, the engine driving the powerhouse that ultimately returns to farmers is our beef and dairy exports). Horticulture, cereals and mushroom sales have remained largely static in export value terms for the last 10 years.

Beverage sales have increased – in fact the value of beverage sales has increased 100% in the last 10 years, from €1bn in 2015 to sales valued at over €2bn in this week’s report.

In 2015, beverage export sales were driven by mineral water and cider sales. In 2023, the core value driver was whiskey. Whiskey export values last year totalled over €1bn.

In last week’s tillage pages, Siobhán Walsh suggested that given the limited grain production capacity on this island, we should grow and market more premium Irish malt, producing more high value Irish whiskey and beer.

Her hypothesis is that surely a co-ordinated marketing plan, driven on co-op principles, can drive a globally recognised Irish whiskey brand instead of Irish grain going into lower value livestock feed markets.

So what about premium Irish organic export sales? Ten years ago, high value, premium, organic produce was seen as a possible value add and future export growth strategy.

A new shiny organic scheme had just been launched in 2014. In 2015, organic export sales were valued at €110m – currently, while barely mentioned in this week’s report, the organic export value is only somewhere near €200m.

So yes, we might have three times the number of organic growers, over 1,700 farmers in 2015 to over 5,000 currently. Evidently, despite a host of Irish and EU marketing schemes and the creation of numerous stakeholder reports, organic export values remain well below expectations.

Change

What has changed in terms of where we sell produce in the last ten years? In 2015, two huge trading powerhouses, China and Russia, were seen as a home for future high value dairy growth – especially high value powders.

In 2015, the Bord Bia numbers showed China’s value growth up 16%, driven by dairy and pigmeat exports.

This week’s report suggests the value of Asian exports declined 10%, with the Chinese export value down 13% compared to 2023. Similarly, Russia was still probably seen as a growth market in 2015, and sales, while restricted in 2015, were valued at €50m that year. Russia is closed as a market outlet now.

On the meat side, the US was probably seen as a potential shining light in 2015, with a toe in the market of high-end steak meat traded. The plan was for more premium catering and steak meat, to an affluent US city market with Irish heritage, but it never materialised.

Best estimates put the US market at less than 1,400 tonnes in 2023. The bottom line is the UK is still our main export market. However, the push to diversify markets to allow agility between markets as challenges arise is clearly important.

This week’s Bord Bia CEO sentiment report suggests availability of skilled workers is still a big issue for the industry. This might well be the case, but the meat industry has essentially managed to maintain its workforce by recruiting and upskilling overseas workers.

Evolved

The dairy factories have evolved by making a huge investment in new automated processing facilities that require far fewer ‘hands-on’ workers. Sustainability is a real and growing cost to these Irish companies.

At farm level, the face of the market is hugely different to 2015. Back then, calf registrations were rising, and numbers of breeding females were up. Now our suckler and dairy herds are in decline and beef carcase weights continue to decrease.

For value growth to continue, clearly Irish grain needs to be the basis for Irish drinks. Irish steer beef needs a premium over EU bull beef.

Irish dairy exports, mainly on the back of the Kerrygold brand, need to continue delivering premium back to milk suppliers.

Only then will Irish farmers be able to fully celebrate the success of Irish food and drink exports. Anything else that takes the eye off the ball like organics or alternative foods should be seriously questioned.