ICMSA call on Minister Heydon to “get involved” on catastrophic beef price collapse

ICMSA has continued with its recent intense criticism of beef processors and has called for Minister Heydon to get involved and address what the ICMSA Livestock Chairperson, Michael O’Connell, has called “a series of engineered price cuts inflicted on farmer suppliers that have left them at breaking point.”

Mr. O’Connell, who has been highly critical of both individual processors and MII, has said that the pattern of price cuts seen over the last seven to eight weeks amount to “systematic destruction” of the farmers supplying cattle and Mr O’Connell said that ICMSA “did not believe for one minute that the factories could not have absorbed some of the hit themselves.”

“It’s time to be blunt here: ICMSA believes that the factories so resented paying last year’s prices that they have ‘engineered’ this latest price collapse to recoup the money that they had to pay out last year.  It is time for this catastrophe to be addressed and ICMSA is calling for an all-of-industry approach – not just a select few – that will get to the bottom of what is happening and why.  ICMSA is receiving calls on a weekly basis all pointing to income wipe-out and – set against current stagnant milk price – livelihoods are being hammered for no reason and without any rational explanation”, said Mr. O’Connell.

The ICMSA Livestock Chairperson noted that in 2019, there had been a crisis in the beef industry following months of price cuts and weight cut applications to cattle, but he said that this year’s beef price collapse witnessed since January was both more inexplicable and unsustainable.  

“The most obvious point to make is that In 2019 we didn’t have the same scale of price cuts but neither had we the kind of high beef prices in the previous year; that’s led to a position where permanent damage is being inflicted on a cohort of farmers that will put them past the point-of-rescue.    At base prices of €6.20 and €6.30c/kg, cattle are losing a fortune; they are not covering what they cost to buy – much less the increased costs at farm level. This time last year, we were in uncharted positive territory – never seen before – and the pressure on factories to source cattle was unbelievable with deals including haulage, flat and bottom prices on traditional type cattle as well as ‘sweeteners’ on over-age and cattle outside of carcass specs. How can we work on the basis of the kind of fall that we see 12 months later? Where now farmers are losing hundreds of Euros per head as the factories, on a whim, decide what they want and when?  As a whole sector, we keep on asking ourselves why we can’t get young people to commit to farming – here’s your answer!  If a young person trying to make a return out of beef was to sit in front of a bank manager looking for a mortgage today, they’d be laughed out of the place”, said Mr. O’Connell.

Describing the silence from Minister Heydon the matter as “deafening”, Mr. O’Connell said that industry needs to come together and discuss the matter in detail.

“Confidence amongst beef farmers is at an all-time low, the bills following on from the spring are mounting, tax bills from last year are looming and the increase in the costs of silage production is causing another headache. The developments in the trade this spring is leaving a very anxious few months for beef farmers as they continue to see the price of beef cut 10c per week. Family farms cannot continue to absorb rising costs while seeing their income annihilated – it’s just that simple.  As we have stated a number of times, farmers cannot keep producing the raw materials for factories and being paid ‘what the market returns’ – which everybody knows translates as ‘the absolute lowest price that we can engineer’. At the end of the day, factories are not making a loss – they still have their advance price ‘margin-in-the-middle’ – it is farmers who are taking the brunt of so- called market corrections’ and they are getting so close to the edge of viability that some will go over”, said Mr. O’Connell.

Turning to MII protestations that they are facing increased competition in our traditional markets from imported Antipodean, Mr. O’Connell observed that ICMSA had specifically asked both processors and the wider industry to support the January rally in Athlone against Mercosur – none had bothered to attend.

“The farmers who guaranteed the ‘chain of supply’ were there protesting for the excellence and sustainability of Irish beef production – not the processors or wider industry.  But who are the ones being cleaned out on a weekly basis?  The farmers.  The same people who were in Athlone protesting for a system that allows the beef processors to engineer price cuts that wipe out their income. The shambolic MII performance in front of the Oireachtas Committee was Oscar worthy in pointing to the threats presented to our European markets by Mercosur. But we noticed that neither MII or Bord Bia stood with us in Athlone last January when they had a chance to show their commitment to maintaining our beef markets. Why would they when they can always get their farmer-suppliers to mind their business for them and then repay them by cutting their prices for the next 10 weeks straight!  We don’t want to hear anymore about what could have happened with a Chinese market – that’s the same as what could have happened if the ref played an extra 30 seconds in the Munster final.   Farmers deal in reality, and the factories are going to learn the hard way that there’s a point where farmers just stop taking the pain and losses for the factories. We are at that point now and if Minister Heydon has any interest in maintaining a beef sector worthy of the name – much less developing it – then he’ll need to get much more personally involved than has been the case so far and get everyone involved around a table for some long overdue ‘home truths’ about the Irish beef sector”, said Mr. O’Connell.

“We are not asking for special treatment; we only want a fair price and a viable income for family farms – that surely isn’t too much to ask?”

Ends      11 June 2026

Michael O’Connell, 086-8551015

Chairperson, ICMSA Livestock Committee

Or

Cathal MacCarthy, 087-6168758

ICMSA Press Office