"The sector is farmer-owned and controlled and built up by generations of hard working farm families."
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DEAR EDITOR,
It was with a degree of surprise that I read your Dealer piece last week, where you said that farmers have little control over their own destiny and little negotiating power in buying inputs or selling produce, and that competition law severely restricts the possibility of collective bargaining by large groups of farmers.
I’m sure you’re aware that in this country, we’re lucky to have a co-op sector, fully compliant with competition law that buys 98% of Ireland’s milk, sells 65% of live cattle and sheep, buys 70% of our grain and runs a network of hundreds of agri stores right around the country, supplying competitively priced inputs to farmers in virtually every parish in the country.
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The sector is farmer-owned and controlled and built up by generations of hard working farm families.
You may have been making a more general point about understandable farmer frustrations, but it is wrong to undervalue the strength and importance of the co-operative sector.
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DEAR EDITOR,
It was with a degree of surprise that I read your Dealer piece last week, where you said that farmers have little control over their own destiny and little negotiating power in buying inputs or selling produce, and that competition law severely restricts the possibility of collective bargaining by large groups of farmers.
I’m sure you’re aware that in this country, we’re lucky to have a co-op sector, fully compliant with competition law that buys 98% of Ireland’s milk, sells 65% of live cattle and sheep, buys 70% of our grain and runs a network of hundreds of agri stores right around the country, supplying competitively priced inputs to farmers in virtually every parish in the country.
The sector is farmer-owned and controlled and built up by generations of hard working farm families.
You may have been making a more general point about understandable farmer frustrations, but it is wrong to undervalue the strength and importance of the co-operative sector.
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