President of the Irish Farmers’ Association Francie Gorman has said 40% of farmers have a signficant deficit in the amount of fodder they need for next winter.
It follows a meeting yesterday in Co Kildare between Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon and farming groups including Teagasc, the Irish Farmers’ Association, the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association and Macra na Feirme.
The meeting was held in response to ongoing and deepening concerns within the farming community over fodder supplies, which has seen large parts of the country facing drought conditions due to this summer’s hot, dry conditions.
Minister Heydon told farming groups that the Government will consider extra supports to address concerns over supplies of fodder arising from the recent dry weather as part of the upcoming Budget.
Speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Mr Gorman said that no decision was made at the meeting, “except to have a meeting of the Fodder and Food Security Committee”, and that farmers expect more.
“We came out of that meeting yesterday with no decision taken except to have a meeting of the Fodder and Food Security Committee finally happening at some time into the future, possibly next week.
“And a text message sent out to farmers to do a fodder survey a week ago, and farmers expect a little more action than that from our Government, from our department.”
Food and fodder security concerns remain due to hot and dry weather, says IFA
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Mr Gorman said there was little point doing a survey of “a house when the house is burnt down”.
Minister Heydon agreed to reconvene the National Fodder and Food Security Committee due to ongoing concerns over fodder supplies caused by the recent dry weather.
Farmers are becoming increasingly concerned about fodder supplies both now and into the winter months.
Mr Gorman said that farmers are eating into their winter fodder budgets.
He said he met with other farm organisations yesterday and Teagasc, but there were no banks, co-ops, merchants, credit unions or meat processors around the table.
He described the situation as serious, particularly in the eastern and southern eastern half of the country.
He said farmers cannot make grass grow when the weather does not allow, and that it was a “huge cost issue on farms” as well as a workload issue.
“One of our key asks initially was that the department would co-fund the fertilizer strategy announced by Commissioner Hansen to the maximum. There was no announcement on that yesterday,” he said.
