A spokesman for Mr Larry Goodman yesterday denied that the AIBP/Goodman Group was bottom of the cattle price league, following a protest by 150 beef farmers outside the group's head office in Ardee, Co Louth. Sean MacConnell, Irish Times Agriculture Correspondent, reports.
The protest was led by the Irish Farmers Association president, Mr John Dillon, who said the cattle price campaign had been opened in Ardee to highlight the fact that the group, which slaughters a quarter of the country's cattle, was paying less than other factories.
"This is despite the Anglo-Irish Beef-Processing group having major supermarket contracts in the lucrative UK market where AIBP UK pays farmers up to €180 per head more for similar cattle," he said.
The company, he claimed, was leading the downward cattle price charge against farmers, which had seen prices to farmers cut by €75 an animal in the last seven weeks.
Last night a spokesman for Mr Goodman said the prices recorded in last week's Irish Farmers Journal did not reflect the true position, and that only one AIBP plant ranked in the bottom five for top-grade cattle.
He said the prices quoted in the newspaper were a mix of prices paid for cattle over and under 30 months of age and that this would obviously distort any price comparisons.
"AIBP has always had a policy of always paying its farmer suppliers a good fair price for cattle on the day of slaughter in an honest, honourable and transparent fashion - a policy which continues to this day," he said. "Prices paid to farmers for their cattle are dictated by the markets available for those cattle and not by anything else."
The spokesman added that three of the AIBP plants were located in counties with high BSE levels and from which Russia, an important buyer of Irish beef, would not take produce. This obviously had an effect on pricing.
"In relation to price in the UK, it must be noted that only a small amount of the Irish beef kill goes directly to the major UK supermarkets," he added. "Irish beef must compete in the UK wholesale and food services sector against imports from South America which are substantially cheaper than Irish beef.
"The UK market requirement is for beef from cattle aged under 30 months. AIBP have complied rigidly with this market requirement."
The spokesman added that following publication of last week's figures in the trade journal, a meeting had been offered to the IFA. Nothing had been heard from the IFA until the protest took place yesterday morning.
Mr Dillon also criticised the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Mr Walsh, for his silence in the face of falling cattle prices.