asked the Minister for Agriculture the average price per ton c.i.f. paid since 1st January 1962 for imported (a) maize (b) milo and (c) wheat offals, and the price realised for unmillable wheat of this year's harvest sold recently.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Imports of Coarse Grains.
30.
The average price at which maize, including milo, was imported in the period from 1st January, 1962, to 30th September, 1962, which is the latest date up to which statistics are available, is, £19.18.0. per ton c.i.f. Statistics regarding milo are not separately available. The average price at which wheat offals were imported in the same period was £20.9.0. per ton c.i.f.
The price of unmillable wheat of the 1962 crop sold by An Bord Gráin on the home market is approximately £22 a ton. Details were published by the Board on 27th October, 1962.
Export sales by the Board have been at prices ranging from £16.10.0. per ton f.o.b. to £17.15.0. per ton ex-store.
Could I ask the Minister how he justifies the imports of large quantities of maize and milo and of large quantities of pollard of inferior feeding value, while we have such enormous quantities of unmillable wheat which, comparatively speaking, is of high feeding value for export?
I have told the House on a number of occasions the several reasons for that decision. I suppose I must try to repeat some of them. As the Deputy is aware, the acreage under feeding barley has been increasing substantially in recent years. There is a guaranteed price to the grower. When a guaranteed price is given, it is necessary to make arrangements for the taking up of the crop and paying for it at that price. These announcements have to be made early on—in fact, the announcement this year of the confirmation of that arrangement with the compound feeding stuff manufacturers was announced some time in July—and it is not possible to visualise what the wheat crop will be like at that time. These are considerations that have to be kept in mind, as well as the additional consideration that in a year such as this, when you have a large percentage of unmillable wheat, and when you have increased acreage and increased tonnage of barley, as we had this year, it is necessary at the same time to think in terms of convenient and economic storage. Any decision made in this regard was made in full consultation with the Grain Board and other interests before this necessary course was taken.
May I ask the Minister first, how, outside of Grangegorman asylum, a scheme can be operated by the Irish Department of Agriculture under which we export wheat at £16 10s. per ton and import inferior Russian pollard at £20 9s. per ton; secondly, if it is not true that the transport used in emptying the ships of Russian pollard was not in fact withdrawn from the task of moving Irish wheat from Irish fields to mills; and thirdly, whether it is not true that Russian pollard taken off ships at the North Wall occupies just as much storage space as Irish wheat taken off a field in Ireland? Outside Grangegorman, how could any scheme of that kind commend itself to an Irish Minister for Agriculture?
It is, of course, as the Deputy knows very well, very easy at Question Time to misrepresent the situation with which the Department and myself are confronted in this regard. But I can assure the Deputy and the House that when it is necessary, as it is every year, to make an arrangement for the taking up of the barley crop, all the problems which strike us in regard to the wheat harvest are not apparent to everybody. The arrangement made in regard to barley for the past three years or so, was entered into in an experimental way with my full approval. I found it a very excellent arrangement, indeed, which worked splendidly in comparison with the situation that existed prior to this method of purchase of the barley crop. But when you strike a year like this, when more than 50 per cent. of the wheat crop is unmillable and which also gives a heavy yield, we cannot at that stage simply say that the arrangement which we made with the compounders is no longer workable from our point of view, that we abandon that arrangement. That cannot be done. Barley is encouraged for the purpose of providing as much of our feed requirements as possible. Wheat is grown for an entirely different purpose—for conversion into flour for human consumption. Some years, as a result of a bad harvest, we find ourselves having to handle, in addition to the barley, that unmillable wheat. There is nothing daft about the decisions that have been made in this regard. They are the only practicable decisions any sensible person could make, having regard to all the facts.
How can you proceed to justify selling Irish——
This is developing into an argument.
I want a specific answer to this question, which I think is a reasonable one. How can you justify selling Irish wheat at £16 10s. per ton and, on the same day, buying Russian pollard at £20 9s. shipped here? If that does not sound daft, what does?
Our understanding with the compounders is that they will provide a ready market at a fixed price for all the barley grown.
Why should they not?
As a result of that agreement, they are allowed licences for the import of maize and milo following discussions with my Department. In addition, they are reasonably free to import offal. We entered into that arrangement with them deliberately because we were convinced it was the best arrangement and much more attractive than the previous arrangement in the sense that, under it, feeding stuffs are provided at a cheaper rate than they otherwise would be.
Would the Minister tell me (1) whether he has now imposed restrictions on the import of feeding stuffs that can be replaced by millable wheat and (2) how much this arrangement he refers to is worth to the compounders or millers, whichever it is?
This is not the first year in which this arrangement was operated satisfactorily. There has been no scheme for the purchase of grain in respect of which I received fewer complaints. It is an ideal scheme. I know that when we get harvests such as the one through which we have passed, wheat can become a problem. But you cannot blow hot and cold on these matters. You have to face up in an honourable way to the problems presented by a bad harvest, and not by attempting to sidestep the contractual obligations you have entered into and which have worked satisfactorily in a normal year.
Surely, after the Taoiseach's statement, Irish livestock would not be allowed to eat Russian pollard?
31.
asked the Minister for Agriculture if the issue of licences for the import of coarse grains, including maize and milo, is restricted to any group of persons or companies; if the issue of such licences is conditional on the uptake of the native barley crop; if so, who the persons or companies are (a) who guarantee the uptake, and (b) who have received import licences for coarse grains, including maize and milo, since 1st January, 1962.
Licences for the import of maize and milo are granted only to members of the Federation of Irish Feeding Stuffs Manufacturers in consideration of their undertaking to provide a ready market at the guaranteed price for all home-produced feeding barley.
When imports of milling and feeding oats are necessary, due to a shortage of home supplies, the import licences are granted to oatmeal millers and horse feeders, respectively.
The question of licences for the import of feeding barley does not arise.