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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 6 Nov 1940

Vol. 81 No. 3

Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Surplus Barley Crop.

asked the Minister for Agriculture if he will state why, in view of his inability to secure a higher export quota for our bacon, licences to export barley have been refused by his Department, and what he proposes to do with this surplus barley, having regard to his own recent advice to farmers to reduce the pig population as rapidly as possible.

asked the Minister for Agriculture if he will give an estimate of the amount of barley which will lie on the hands of farmers and grain merchants after supplying our brewing and distilling requirements for the present season.

I propose to answer together the Deputy's two questions regarding barley. The area sown with barley in 1940 was approximately 138,100 acres, and it is estimated that somewhat less than one-half of the produce will be absorbed by the brewing and distilling industries. The Deputy is not correct in stating that I have advised farmers to reduce stocks of pigs at present, but even if a reduction in the number of pigs fattened should become necessary it is desirable that, in view of the increasing difficulty of obtaining supplies of imported feeding stuffs, the whole of the barley not required for industrial purposes should be retained for feeding purposes, and for that reason I am not prepared to grant licences for the export of barley.

I would ask the Minister again the same question: what is going to happen the barley producer who cannot get a customer?

He will get a customer.

Will the Minister get one for him?

I do not think that is my job.

Will the Minister prevent him from getting a customer?

Would the Minister not consider making up some scheme whereby barley would be taken off the hands of small farmers who have not got adequate storage for it.

And oats.

We will deal with oats later. I think myself that barley will pass into consumption before next spring. Therefore, it is doubly easy for the Government to assist us in the storage of it. I have stacks of barley in the fields, and the rats are making cow tracks through them. You can see the tracks of the rats where they walk away in the grass. When we threshed the barley, after it had been about a month in the field, I think we killed about 150 rats in about 40 small stacks. Picture the small farmer who sees the rats eating his crop off the land and cannot thresh it because he has nowhere to put it. I urge on the Minister to look into the matter and see if some plan could not be worked out to relieve the small man who has not got storage. All that the Minister need do is to provide for storage, because I believe that by February or March next, or by May at the very latest, the barley will have passed into consumption.

Does the Minister appreciate the feeling there is through the country on this matter? Does he realise that it is only the big men who have been able to get their barley threshed; that they were the only people who were able to get a machine and so were enabled to get the barley away at Guinness' price of 30/- per barrel? Does he realise that the small farmer, through no fault of his own, could not get a machine, and therefore got left? He is in the position now that he cannot sell his barley while his neighbour, the big farmer, was able to get his barley threshed and get it away at 30/- per barrel. All that has created a very bitter feeling throughout the country, and I wonder if the Minister realises it. Is the Minister prepared to consider Deputy Dillon's suggestion of pooling the barley we have in the country at a fair price?

Deputies surely must realise that if you had anything like a Government scheme to take up all the barley and oats in the country, keeping it and storing it and sending it on to the maize millers would add considerably to the cost. Someone would have to bear the cost of that: either the farmers buying the grain for feeding stuffs or the farmers selling it for feeding stuffs. The fewer intermediaries we have in this matter the better, because the fewer we have the more the grower will get for his crop. I think it is really foolish to advocate any such scheme. If the Deputies opposite have made any inquiries in the matter, I am sure they must be convinced that there will be very little barley on farmers' hands in the course of the next few weeks, not to speak of the next few months. I know there is oats on hands. We know that about five-sixths of the oats grown by farmers is used by themselves. That has always been the case, and always will be. Hence there is very little surplus oats for sale. The fact that a lot of farmers grew barley this year— that is barley over and above what was required—was a speculation on their part. As far as this Government is concerned, it cannot be denied that they have always advised farmers to grow wheat if they wanted a ready market. We cannot be blamed, in any part of our propaganda, with regard to the growing of crops. The farmer was entitled to speculate on setting a good price for his barley if he grew it. If he failed to get that, I suppose he was unfortunate, and that is all we can say.

Why does the Minister refuse to give him an export market? If it is considered to be in the national interest to conserve food supplies, why ask the small farmers in the country to finance that scheme? Why does not the nation, as a whole, finance it, and why penalise the individual farmers who are now left with barley on their hands? The whole situation should be taken into account, but neither the Minister nor his Department has ever faced up to that aspect of the question.

Perhaps the Deputy has not faced up to the aspects of that question either. If farmers want feeding stuffs for their animals, it is the farmers who will have to produce them. Are you going to ask the people in the towns to produce them?

Are you not compelling the farmers to produce them?

And now you will not let them sell them.

No, because we believe there will be a shortage of feeding stuffs next spring.

Why do you not buy them?

Let the farmers keep their own feeding stuffs for themselves.

They cannot, because the rats are eating them.

Everything would be all right, in the Deputies' view, but for the Government.

It is a rat farm you ought to be running.

I have not as many rats as you have. According to yourself, you had 160 rats in one stack.

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