It’s often said that Ireland’s competitive advantage in farming is the fact that we can grow grass like no other country in the world.

That’s because of our temperate climate: we normally get plenty of rain during the summer, which keeps grass growing, and we also tend to avoid really high temperatures that would burn grass.

The fact that cattle and sheep graze outside for nine or 10 months of the year is pretty unique.

Competitive advantage

A competitive advantage is anything that gives us a head start on our competitors.

Take the Irish rugby team; if the men in the scrum are heavier than other scrums, then they will be harder to move.

If the lineout is taller than every other team’s, they should reach the ball first – and if the backs are faster than everyone else, they will be harder to catch as they run for the line. Having all these abilities would give Ireland a competitive advantage over other teams.

Irish farming is also in a competition, because we are competing with other countries for market access.

This is because over 90% of our meat and dairy is exported from the island, so if we can produce higher quality food at lower costs than other countries, then we have a competitive advantage in the marketplace.

This is because the price of food is more or less the same all over the world.

Maintaining this competitive advantage is really important, but in my view it’s not discussed often enough.

Grass is cheap to grow and it’s great feed for livestock, but all too often we hear people in the industry and even farmers themselves trying to knock it.

Grass is our luxury here in Ireland

The thing is, lots of people make their living by selling things other than grass. Things like meal, diet feeders, special additives and total mixed rations are not necessary in a simple, grass-based system.

Nor do farmers need to pay for the expertise required to make them all work together.

Most other countries do require all these things, because they can’t rely on grass. That then increases their costs of production and, because the price of milk and meat is more or less the same all over Europe, these farmers make less money.

Very often, the promise of higher output for each animal is promised if a farmer feeds extra meal or buys this or that supplement.

While that may very well be true, the extra cost of input often doesn’t cover the extra output as a result of using that input.

It might, if milk price is high and input costs are low, but then you can end up in a situation where the farmer gets accustomed to buying that input, or they change their system because of it – and then they feel they can’t do without buying it.

Anything that moves away from the low-cost, simple grass-based system is eroding Irish farming’s competitive advantage, and this is bad news in the long term because it means Irish farmers will be less resilient, and Irish food exports will be less competitive, meaning we will lose market share.

Grass awareness is needed

Young farmers need to be aware of this when thinking about their future careers in farming or agriculture.

Rather than selling inputs to farmers that they don’t really need, young people should be looking to improve their skills at managing grass.

There is a huge knowledge gap when it comes to grassland management, both on farms and in the industry between advisers and farmers.

Making more use of grass and getting better at marketing grass will ultimately increase Ireland’s competitive advantage, which will then make Ireland’s farming more profitable.

It’ll be like adding a few more Tadhg Furlongs to Ireland’s scrum and a few more Devin Toners to Ireland’s lineout.