"The Taoiseach has said he will oppose this Mercosur deal," Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association (ICSA) president Sean McNamara told protesting farmers outside Dail Éireann on Tuesday.

"We want him to oppose any Mercosur deal - and every Mercosur deal."

His words were echoed by Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) president Francie Gorman, who lent his support to the ICSA protest.

Gorman highlighted the fact that the Taoiseach's commitment on Mercosur had been obtained at the IFA's event in the Curragh last week.

Gorman said that farmers all over Europe are of one mind on this issue.

"At last week's Copa-Cogeca meeting in France, every single farmer organisation were joined in opposition to a Mercosur deal that sees South American beef swapped in for German cars," he told the Irish Farmers Journal.

Support

Irish Natura and Hill Farmers Association (INHFA) deputy president John Joe Fitzgerald had travelled to Dáil Éireann from Kerry to lend his support and that of his organisation to the protest.

"We want to see a future for farming in the west of Ireland," he said, "and a vibrant suckler sector is central to that future."

ICSA beef chair John Cleary explained that the central problem with a Mercosur deal is the lack of equivalent standards for the beef that would flood into the EU from Brazil and Argentina (among others).

"South American beef is produced under very different circumstances to those that Irish farmers have to work under. We have fought long and hard to build up markets across Europe - it's taken a long number of years.

"Prices will suffer and we can't afford to produce beef with a first-world cost basis and to strict traceability and production standards, and then take a world market price."

Transition

The fear the ICSA has is that a deal will be agreed while the Irish government is in transition as we approach a general election.

"The Brazilian president wants to push a deal at the upcoming G20 summit - the Irish government, election or no election, must make its voice heard," said Cleary.

A large number of politicians, including Sinn Féin agriculture spokesperson Martin Kenny, Independent Ireland's Michael Collins and Michael Fitzmaurice, Independents Verona Murphy, Sean Canney and Mattie McGrath, and Fianna Fáil Senator Paul Daly stopped by to offer support to the protesting farmers.