Seanad Éireann debate -
Thursday, 11 Feb 1999

Vol. 158 No. 4

Adjournment Matter. - Fodder Relief Scheme.

Mrs. Taylor-Quinn

The fodder crisis is affecting County Clare and other areas. I welcome the Minister of State to the House. The Minister of State's visits to the House are becoming more regular, but he still has not managed to persuade the Minister, Deputy Walsh, to make a guest appearance in the Upper House. We look forward to that happening. I welcome the Minister of State's attendance, however.

A serious problem has arisen because for the past 18 months there has been nearly continuous rainfall in the west. It has been some of the worst weather for a long time and County Clare has been seriously affected. During last summer's harvesting season most farmers in the county managed to save only 20 per cent of their fodder and its quality was not on a par with that harvested in better weather conditions. Both the quality and quantity of the fodder has fallen, raising serious problems in relation to the welfare of stock.

We raised this matter repeatedly in the last session. In August I requested the Minister for Agriculture and Food to double the headage payments because I could foresee the problems that would arise. The seriousness of the problem has gone far beyond any of our expectations and is greater than anyone anticipated. The situation in County Clare is chronic.

The Minister eventually responded with the paltry proposal of £300 per farmer in certain district electoral divisions. Unfortunately, many other farmers in adjoining DEDs who were in worse situations received nothing. The amount of money involved was so small that it was only a drop in the ocean compared to what is required.

While there are a few large farmers in County Clare, the bulk of the farming community there comprises small to medium farmers who are in dire straits because of the lack of fodder, the massive drop in cattle prices and the fall in the milk yield this season. The same number of cattle were put through Clare marts last year, but the cash intake was down by £10 million. That is a substantial drop in the amount of money in circulation among the farming community in the county. The crisis is very real. Both the IFA and Clare Marts were so concerned that Mr. Donal Ryan, manager of Clare Marts, proposed two weeks ago that his committee should contact the organisations in other counties to try to establish where fodder was available. They contacted their counterparts in Wexford and a request was made to farmers there to contribute four or five bales each to farmers in County Clare. At least 1,000 bales have been collected to date and Clare Marts are transporting them to Clare free of charge. The average cost of transportation varies from £5 to £6.50 per bale, but Clare Marts are meeting this cost.

One problem is that there is no structure to source fodder. The Minister for Agriculture and Food could usefully put such a structure in place so that fodder sources can be identified and deployed. We do not want a repeat of the Famine when thousands of people died, yet there was much food in the country. Animals should not be dying when fodder is available but it is not used because there is no way of sourcing it. I appeal to the Minister to do something about providing a structure to source fodder.

I want to put on record my thanks to the farmers of Wexford for their generosity to farming families in County Clare. One person told me yesterday that when a load of bales arrived in one particular parish it was like manna coming from heaven. The crisis is real and the concern is desperate. The will and ability of people to respond to the situation has become critical. Many of them do not know what to do and that is why the Minister for Agriculture and Food should respond positively.

A number of farmers in Clare, who had adequate fodder supplies, gave it to their neighbours in need. They must also be thanked for the work they have done in that area. The chairman and committee of Clare Marts also deserve thanks for having taken the initiative, along with the IFA in Clare and Wexford. Teagasc will decide where the fodder is most needed.

The Minister should consider providing assistance towards the transportation of fodder. One thousand bales came to Clare from Wexford. Another 1,500 bales have been identified in the Minister of State's county of Cork, which must be transported. They are being purchased for £20 a bale but the transportation costs are quite high. Clare Marts are hoping to meet them but the Department of Agriculture and Food has a particular responsibility and should examine the possibility of assisting this exercise in some way.

Clare will have a serious fodder problem up to the end of May and it is not yet mid-February. We have a long way to go. As I said in the House yesterday, the burn house in Clare is extremely busy with the disposal of animal carcases and additional lorries have been purchased to transport them for incineration. Many are being left in various places due to lack of transport. That is the reality in Clare and elsewhere. Nothing that is said in the House can overestimate the seriousness of the crisis for farmers.

The Minister of State is a farmer himself, but is not in the same league as those whom I represent in County Clare. He has some idea of what the crisis is like and he can at least empathise with farmers in the west. I urge him, as a level headed person, to deal with the realities of the situation. We have had fine debates in the House on the World Trade Organisation and the Common Agricultural Policy, but the immediate reality is that farming families are in a desperate situation. They have gone beyond crying for help and badly require assistance. I am sure the Minister will be in a position to respond. I urge him to provide a structure for sourcing fodder and to ensure that the cost of transporting the fodder is met by the Department.

Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture and Food (Mr. N. O'Keeffe)

I thank Senator Taylor-Quinn for having raised this matter. I fully understand what she is talking about. I am pleased to have another opportunity of commenting on the difficulties which many farmers are facing due to a shortage of fodder for livestock feeding. These difficulties have their origin in the unusually wet weather during the summer and autumn of last year which, combined with below normal sunshine, resulted in reduced grass growth.

The situation was most acute in the peaty and heavy clay soil areas of certain counties where machinery could not operate on the land due to the waterlogged conditions of the fields. The capability of farmers in these areas to make silage and hay was greatly reduced. Unfortunately, the poor weather persisted into September and this exacerbated the fodder difficulty in the most seriously affected areas. In many cases animals had to be brought indoors much earlier than normal and this added to demand for already scarce supplies of winter fodder.

While there was much talk about fodder difficulties in different parts of the country, I was anxious to get an independent assessment of the extent of the problem and the likely number of farmers involved. For this purpose I arranged with Teagasc to undertake a series of surveys, the first in August last which confirmed that there were significant problems in the heavy wet land of the north west and south west, and that over half of all farmers in these areas would be short of fodder over the winter. Reports from the Department's own inspectorate confirmed the Teagasc findings.

In an effort to identify the areas with the most severe fodder difficulties, another report was prepared by Teagasc in September which concentrated specifically on the worst affected areas. The following areas were listed by Teagasc in its report: County Leitrim; west Cavan; north Roscommon, Keadue, Arigna; along the rivers Shannon and Suck, including the Shannon Callows; north Longford; Sligo, particularly west and south Sligo; in Mayo the Westport, Belmullet, Ballina and Swinford areas; all areas of Donegal except east Donegal, west and south-west Limerick, all areas of Clare, especially parts of west and north Clare, south and east of Killarney, County Kerry, the west Duhallow and Skibbereen-Bantry areas of west Cork, and Connemara in County Galway.

On 29 September 1998 the Government agreed to the expenditure of an additional £10 million to alleviate the hardship caused to farmers by the adverse weather conditions and on 21 October I announced details of a special fodder scheme. The scheme was targeted at "worst affected areas" and applied to all mountain sheep farmers, suckler cow producers and small scale dairy farmers with milk quotas of less than 35,000 gallons. As the scheme fell within the EU rules on State aids, clearance had to be sought from the Commission and this was received on 8 December 1998. The counties concerned were Cavan, Clare, Cork, Donegal, Galway, Kerry, Leitrim, Limerick, Longford, Mayo, Roscommon and Sligo. Initially 753 district electoral divisions were involved, but this figure was subsequently revised upwards to 843 or 50 per cent of all DEDs in the 12 counties concerned.

The payment rates were set as follows: £4 per ewe or hogget up to 75 head for sheep farmers with mountain ewes, £40 per suckler cow up to a ceiling of 7.5 cows for suckler cow farmers and £30 per 1,000 gallons of milk up to 10,000 gallons for small scale dairy farmers with a quota of less than 35,000 gallons. Payments made under the scheme were as follows: 43,969 suckler cow and hill sheep farmers received £10.835 million, and 6,851 dairy farmers received £1.294 million. In all, payments totalling £12.129 million were made.

While the provision of over £12 million brought welcome assistance to 50,000 farmers most affected by the fodder crisis, a further report on the winter fodder crisis prepared by Teagasc in January this year indicated that the position had deteriorated further due to continuous wet weather conditions, high stock levels on farms, earlier winter feedings because of such conditions and poor silage quality. The difficulties are widespread in the less favoured areas. The worst affected areas listed in the north region are: Cavan, Monaghan, Clare, Donegal, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Roscommon and Sligo. In the south region the relevant areas are Kerry, west and north-west Cork, including Duhallow, west Limerick and certain limited areas of Laois and Tipperary.

The Government has decided that a further scheme should be introduced to help farmers in these areas and, while the general outline of the scheme was announced on 2 February, the details of the scheme are currently being finalised. Some £20 million is being made available for the scheme. Every effort will be made to direct aid at the most deserving cases. However, I am anxious to ensure that the grants are paid as quickly as possible to bring immediate relief to those most in need. The Department will try to do this with the minimum of red tape while being conscious of the need to ensure proper accountability for any funds paid out.

I am fully aware of the exceptional difficulties which virtually all sectors of farming are facing. I have attempted to alleviate these through the introduction of the second fodder relief scheme, and through several other measures which have been announced over the past six months. These include increases in export refunds for beef, introducing aid to private storage of sheepmeat, improving access to intervention for heavier cattle, increasing the rate of advance payment of suckler cow and special beef premia, speeding up all payments to farmers, introducing a special package of over £20 million, including £12 million in fodder payments, £6 million for mountain ewe destocking and almost £3 million in sheep headage top up, approval of additional shipping capacity for export of livestock, and making intervention barley available to the feed trade. The actions taken by me have been many and decisive and I will continue to take all possible steps to protect the interests of farmers.

I congratulate the Clare and Wexford farmers and marts for co-operating to alleviate the fodder crisis in Clare. I do not wish to sound critical, but it is not necessary for animals to starve in the current climate. While there is a fodder shortage in roughage, hay and straw, there is a substantial amount of concentrate feed which is being sold by compounders at good value. The impression should not be given that animals are being allowed to die because there is a shortage of fodder. Animals die every year, even in the best fodder years. It should not happen and I cannot condone it. Management and animal husbandry is the key. Fodder is not the only problem.

We have paid out £300 to every farmer affected and have given top-ups to some of them. Teagasc has also done significant work by sending its officials to meetings and clinics to assist farmers, and it has targeted and focused on those most in difficulty. I attended a meeting of dairy farmers in Ennistymon, County Clare. I am aware of the crisis which exists there and have reported on it. I have also met representative groups of farmers and private deputations. If we were to give £300 to every farmer in the country, it would cost the Exchequer about £45 million to £50 million. Such money does not grow on trees. We have identified as much as we can of the problem. The £300 can be used in whatever way farmers want. It can be used to buy fodder, feed or fertiliser to grow grass to provide fodder. There are many ways of getting around the problem.

I thank the Senator for raising the matter and understand her concerns. I admire her interest in agricultural matters. Every time I come to the House, she is to the forefront in making contributions. Sometimes I do not agree with her but her contributions are worthwhile.

Mrs. Taylor-Quinn

Perhaps the Minister of State would consider my suggestion of putting in place some structure to source fodder. He said there was no need for cattle to die because there is plenty of compound. However, cattle also need roughage. Many farmers in Clare would dearly love to buy compound but they do not have the money. Small and medium-sized farmers are affected. Many will not admit that they do not have the money. Some merchants will not give fodder to them on credit because they are afraid they will not have the funds to meet the bill at the end of the year. That is a problem.

Mr. N. O'Keeffe

All the matters the Senator has raised will be noted on the record of the House and the Minister and my officials will study her speech.

Mrs. Taylor-Quinn

I will be depending on the Minister of State.

The Seanad adjourned at 5 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, 17 February 1999.