The latest outbreaks of foot-and-mouth in Northumbria are not expected to affect Irish meat exports adversely.
Instead Northumberland's difficulty should keep Irish beef exports to Britain and sheep meat to France at the increased levels they achieved in the last six months.
However, the renewed outbreaks are unlikely to lift beef prices in the factories in the Republic, which, at 80 to 81p a lb are 5 per cent below last year's level for the same month, and considerably down on the second half of last year.
Emergency intervention for steers is being introduced this week. Tenders from factories close at noon today, and a decision will be taken at the EU Beef Management Committee meeting on Friday on the price at which intervention will apply. Another tender is being submitted for the Special Purchase Scheme, also for Friday's meeting.
"As regards exports, it's not going to affect them one way or the other at the moment. It highlights the fact that this disease is very firmly set in the UK at this stage and confirms what trouble we would be in if it happened here," said Mr Padraig Brennan, Bord Bia's senior business analyst.
Britain is expected to take 160,000 tonnes of Irish beef this year, compared with 115,000 tonnes last year. And Irish beef is back in the six major supermarket multiples in Britain. This will absorb some of the surplus of 5,000 to 6,000 prime cattle a week being slaughtered in meat factories, but certainly not all. This surplus cattle slaughtering would appear to be held in storage for the Russian market later this year.
The level of lamb exports to France cannot increase significantly, but prices have soared from 105p a lb last year to about 160p this year. This is not because the French are eating more lamb, but because Irish lamb has displaced British product on the French market.
"The main impact of foot-and-mouth disease is that UK cattle slaughterings are down by 10 to 15 per cent, and people are holding on to animals for restocking, leading to increased imports on the UK market," said Mr Brennan. "Exports, running week on week, could be maybe 20 per cent more than this time last year."
But consumer confidence in beef is still not recovering significantly. Mr Brennan estimates that Irish beef exports to France will be down to 15,000 tonnes from 40,000 tonnes last year; to Italy down to 15,000 tonnes from 30,000 tonnes; and to Holland down to 18,000 tonnes from 28,000 tonnes.
Over the month of August, between 8,000 and 8,500 cows will have been slaughtered under the Special Purchase Scheme, and that level of slaughtering is expected in coming weeks. No steers or heifers are now going into this scheme. What it is doing is providing stability for cow beef prices.
Intervention has not been available for Irish beef since the end of last year. But Ireland now can tender for intervention for "O" grade steers, the level below the average "R" grade. Mr Brennan said it would be difficult to predict the intervention price. Last year the price for "R" grade bull beef was 78p, including VAT.
Many international markets still are closed to Irish cattle and beef. Russia recently reopened for beef and Lebanon for live cattle. There still is no decision from Egypt, the Republic's main outlet for beef exports outside the EU, on when exports can resume. Egypt had been taking 150,000 tonnes a year, almost equivalent to the British market.