EU export refund cuts are responsible for falling beef prices, says the Irish Farmers' Association, which is demanding that the refunds be restored to September 1995 levels.
The price fall was so severe that Ireland could qualify for EU intervention for the first time in nearly two years, the IFA president, Mr John Donnelly, told a press conference in Dublin yesterday.
Live shippers, he said, were no longer buying cattle and the factories were paying only 98p per lb, a price likely to ruin 5,000 specialist farmers.
This group, which fattens cattle in the winter, could lose £70 per animal over the spring, amounting to £27 million on the 460,000 head ready for sale, he said.
Continuity of supply to factories and for export markets in live cattle would be endangered since such farmers needed a minimum of 105p per lb to break even, Mr Donnelly added.
He produced figures from Teagasc, the agriculture and food development authority, which show cattle finishers needed 109p per lb to make a margin of £50 per head.
Mr Michael Berkery, the IFA general secretary, said export refund rates had been cut by 35 per cent since September. But there were enough live export licences, pre fixed at September levels, to keep prices high until the end of February.
Most of these licences are being held by people in the Netherlands who have no factories or experience in shipping animals but are selling them to Irish factories and exporters at a high price," he said.
"We have heard figures of up to 10p a lb being sought by these traders who have disrupted our cattle economy and may drive people out of business," he said.
The Minister for Agriculture, Mr Yates, had guaranteed that he would work for the restoration of last September's levels at Friday's EU beef management committee