The Irish Department of Agriculture is reportedly considering cull of 65K cows per year for the next 3 years due to pressure from Brussels.
The IDA said reports were referring to a “modeling document” included in a “deliberative process,” but no final plans have been agreed upon.
According to the president of the Irish Farmers’ Association, Tim Cullinan, Reports like this only serve to further fuel the view that the government is working behind the scenes to undermine our dairy and livestock sectors”. He warned that beef production would simply shift out of the country if the plan were to be enforced, adding that the focus should be on providing a pathway for the next generation to get into farming.
“We’re the one industry with a significant roadmap, and, to be quite honest with you, our herd isn’t any larger than it was 25 to 30 years ago,” Pat McCormack, president of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association, added. “Can the same be said for the transport industry, can the same be said for the aviation industry?”
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The Irish Independent first reported about the Irish Department of Agriculture document, revealing a proposition of €5,000 compensation per cow.
Irish politician Peadar Tóibín, the Aontú party leader, spoke before the Irish Parliament last week, citing figures from the Farming Independent showing 200,000 cattle to be culled by 2025.
“Just a year and half’s time. It’s an incredible threat to the farming sector at a cost of about €600 million. Now, a full 25% of beef that’s being imported into the European Union is now coming from Brazil,” Tóibín said during a May 30 session. “How is it environmentally friendly to kill large swathes of the Amazon, import that beef from Brazil to substitute for Irish beef that’s been culled here in this state. It’s a significant threat hanging over farmers in this country, and we must have a debate crystallizing exactly what the plan of this government is.”
Australian geologist Ian Plimer talking about the document, said the Irish know about this from the potato famine, where a third of their population died and a third emigrated. Plimer said the same thing will happen this time around.
They will lose productive people from Ireland, and they’ll go somewhere else.” Plimer added that the proposal would “only end in disaster.”
Commenting on the situation, elon Musk, who is also the CEO of Twitter and numerous other companies, said such policies “really need to stop”.
Responding to Twitter user, who said “The push to end life, of both animals and humans, in the name of “climate activism” is fundamentally evil,” Musk said this really needs to stop, killing some cows doesn’t matter for climate change.”
Ireland has approximately 2.5 million dairy and beef cows, according to the provisional Irish June Livestock Survey published by AHDB.
Beef and dairy account for around two-thirds of its agricultural output, with around 90 per cent of the produce exported.
Responding to the viral media reports, Ireland’s Department for Agriculture said the proposal was just a “modelling document”.
