A group of farmers from Tipperary, led by IFA presidential hopeful and current treasurer Tim Cullinan, have demanded an immediate investigation into the beef industry by the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC).
A group of farmers from Tipperary, led by IFA presidential hopeful and current treasurer Tim Cullinan, have demanded an immediate investigation into the beef industry by the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC).
Cullinan and the farmers staged a protest outside the CCPC on Tuesday afternoon. Having been refused entry, farmers made their way into the lobby and presented a letter to a representative of CCPC chair Isolde Goggin.
The letter, penned by Cullinan, said there is a cartel in operation among beef processors. The letter stated the cartel had been on public display during beef talks between beef industry stakeholders.
Cullinan says that allowing Meat Industry Ireland (MII) represent and negotiate on the behalf of all processors at the recent beef industry talks was in breach of competition law. He said farmers should be able to sit around the table with factories individually to discuss both bonus and price issues.
“In the course of these meeting MII co-ordinated the terms and conditions of trade in the purchase of cattle, thereby in unison influencing the price paid to farmers,” the letter reads.
Demands
Speaking to the Irish Farmers Journal at the protest Cullinan said: “We cannot continue with a situation whereby a company used by the three largest processors can decide on the elements of the grid that farmers have to comply with to receive a 12c bonus.”
Cullinan called on the CCPC to “instruct MII to desist from setting the terms and conditions for the purchase of cattle on behalf of the country’s beef processors”.
The terms and conditions were related to criteria for animals to receive the in-spec bonus – the 30-month age limit on steers and heifers, the 70 day residency restriction and the four movement rule.
Cullinan said that according to his analysis, these conditions cost farmers over €33m in 2018.
Farmer concerns
One farmer at the protest said he travelled to the protest because farmers could not continue to produce cattle at the price they are receiving.
Another farmer said he wanted to see more transparency in the beef industry: “There’s no transparency of where all the margins are. Farmers are at the lowest end of it.
“It’s like only having one factory in the country. They’re all on the same hymn sheet all the time when there’s supposed to be completion in the meat industry. There is no competition.”
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