FARMING ORGANISATIONS reacted negatively to the new farm deal agreed in Brussels yesterday. The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association was furious over the decision to increase milk quotas in the deal.
Jackie Cahill, the association's president, rejected as "both untrue and misleading" Minister for Agriculture Brendan Smith's claim that the deal represented a gain of €170 million for Irish farmers.
Mr Cahill said that the actual financial loss due to milk price reductions resulting from the decision to increase quota by 1 per cent per year for each of the next five years, would flood the international market with milk and lead to further price drops.
IFA president Padraig Walshe said that the significantly increased modulation cuts on the Single Farm Payment was another direct hit on the incomes of individual farmers on top of the Government's own Budget cuts.
He estimated that the modulation agreement, which will see an extra 5 per cent being taken out of farm payments up to €300,000 for transfer to rural development, would cost farmers €42 million a year when fully implemented.
The modulation agreement would be implemented with cuts of two per cent taken out next year and one per cent taken out each year for the following three years after that.
Mr Walshe said Mr Smith had conceded that he failed to stop the modulation cuts. Against the background of an extremely difficult year and incessant pressure on farm incomes because of rising costs and falling prices, this outcome was another blow to producers' livelihoods, he added.
Mr Walshe also expressed concern that the Minister did not mention sheep farmers in relation to the deal, which would allow the transfer of unspent single farm payments to other sectors.
He said the deal on unspent funds, which would see a minimum of about €23 million per year flow to Irish farmers, would allow funds for sheep farmers. He called for the immediate introduction of a new sheep maintenance payment of at least €20 per ewe.
Macra na Feirme national president Catherine Buckley said the milk quota increase was welcome despite it being a far cry from the early indications from Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel that there would be a soft landing as the system was dismantled.
The president of the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers' Association, Malcolm Thompson, said the deal was another blow to Irish cattle and sheep farmers, as it would reduce their Single Farm Payment and there was still no package for sheep farmers.