asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries if he has sought in this country's negotiations for EEC membership an assurance that our present or equivalent restriction on the export of calves could be retained after Ireland's accession to the EEC.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Membership of EEC.
28.
In view of the effects which the application of the Community price and marketing system will have on prices generally for cattle here, it has not been considered necessary to seek special arrangements for the continuation, after Ireland's accession to the Community, of the licensing control which at present applies to exports of calves.
Could the Minister give some information about the original justification for the introduction of the restriction?
No, I think the Deputy should put down a separate question to get to the roots of this. I do not understand it fully myself. It would be for my own information as well as the Deputy's.
Is the Minister aware that there is concern amongst some farmers in Northern Europe in regard to very heavy exports from their countries of very young calves for veal to Southern Italy, exports which are disrupting the economies to some extent?
This may well be the case with Northern European farmers, let us say in Northern Germany or Denmark, but the Deputy will be aware that the system of husbandry there, and especially the system of zero grazing and the use of grasslands in the way they use them, would warrant the export of calves in their case but not in ours. In our case, having as we do the best conditions in Europe for the production of grass, it would be a very unwise step for Irish farmers to engage in the export of calves except in very extraordinary circumstances because the price they could hope to get by bringing the cattle to maturity, say, at the age of two years—and I think the maturity age will be dropping somewhat—would be much more profitable for Irish farmers than what they would get by exporting them as calves.
Surely the Minister must agree that in the main the people who rear the calves would not be the people bringing them to maturity?
Yes, but the Deputy will also appreciate that expectation of very substantial rises in the price of beef will automatically reflect increases in the price of calves.
It should.
It should, and probably will. If the Deputy has been watching, there is a tendency for calf prices even now to rise quite spectacularly in recent times. I anticipate this rise will continue if the Deputy considers that calves being purchased now will be coming towards maturity after January, 1973. This is one of the reasons why farmers are purchasing calves and paying heavily for them now. They are anticipating the rises likely to accrue at that stage.
29.
asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries the estimated percentage increase in livestock prices when this country joins the EEC.
The current guide price for cattle in the EEC is some 50 per cent above average fat cattle prices here in 1970. There is as yet no common market organisation for sheep and lamb in the Community and consequently it is not possible to say at this stage whether a common price system will operate and if so, at what level. However, having regard to the high prices obtaining at present in the existing Community and to the improved conditions of access to Community markets which we can expect to enjoy following accession, it is reasonable to assume that there will be a substantial rise in Irish sheep and lamb prices after we join. In the case of pigs, where market conditions have a major influence on price, the existing Community average market price is about £19 per cwt. deadweight compared with approximately £16 per cwt. deadweight here in 1970. While on the basis of these figures there should also be an increase in pig prices here following accession, the size of this increase will, of course, depend on actual market conditions prevailing.
Does the Minister envisage that we will get the whole 50 per cent increase immediately on joining the EEC, or would that not be spread over five or six years? What basis has the Minister for claiming that sheep will improve in price? The majority of people are of the opinion that sheep will not. I may be wrong but I have seen articles about this in the Farmers' Journal.
The Deputy will be aware that on accession the quota restrictions to which we have been bound hitherto will disappear and this has been, as the Deputy knows, one of the great limiting factors that has restricted our exports of lamb to the Continent. This will go.
The Minister stated that there would be a 50 per cent increase. Does he envisage that that will come inside the first year or that it will be spread over a number of yeras?
There will be a gradual increase in price. It will be phased over six equal steps.
Question No. 30.
Does the Minister consider that Ireland would benefit by the adoption of a common policy by the Community for sheep and lamb?
That is a separate question.
That is a very general question and I would not like to answer it off the cuff. As the Deputy knows, the Community themselves, after several years deliberation about this, have failed to settle on a common policy yet. While it is of vital importance to us to get access to Europe without quota restrictions I would not like to answer the specific question the Deputy has asked.