The Irish Farmers' Association leader, Mr John Dillon, yesterday claimed that the EU will collapse in chaos if it takes in any more new members and, as far as he was concerned, 27 countries was the top limit for enlargement. Seán Mac Connell, in Limerick, reports.
In a wide-ranging address to his organisation's annual general meeting in Limerick, Mr Dillon attacked the aid agencies Trócaire and Oxfam for giving out "misleading" information, damaging to Irish farmers, in the debate on Third World development at the World Trade negotiations.
Mr Dillon, who had been ratified last year to serve a further two years as head of the 80,000-strong organisation, said that already the Common Agricultural Policy budget was picking up the cost of 10 new member-states, with Romania and Bulgaria probably following in 2007.
"The scale of enlargement is unprecedented. These 12 countries have a population of 106 million. Their income per person, on average, is less than half that of the existing EU.
"They have high expectations that EU membership is their passport to prosperity," said Mr Dillon. "I want to set out a clear marker on behalf of the IFA about any further EU enlargement today. I am saying 27 countries and no further," he told applauding delegates.
"Otherwise the EU will collapse in chaos. Following the current enlargement, a long period of consolidation of up to two decades will be needed to effectively integrate the current 12 new countries. I want the Government to put down a serious marker to other member-states and make it clear that any further enlargement must be on the basis of new EU budget resources and not raiding the CAP budget," he said.
Dealing with the aid and development issues, Mr Dillon said comments made during World Trade negotiations were not only misleading but also highly damaging to Irish farmers.
"The truth is that decoupling will make the CAP one of the least trade distorting policies of the developed countries. But there has been no recognition of this or that the EU has offered full access to its markets to the 49 least developed countries," he said.
"It seems that Oxfam cannot distinguish between the genuine needs of poor farmers in the least developed countries and the demands of ranchers and plantation owners in Argentina, Brazil, Australia and New Zealand."
On farming issues, Mr Dillon warned milk processors and supermarkets that farmers would not pay for selling produce at below cost.
He outlined seven difficulties which had arisen from the decision to decouple payments from production and said he would ask the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh, to address these.
He warned that "farmers were sick of diktats from bureaucrats" and the IFA would not tolerate the bureaucratic sheep tagging system which was being forced on them.
Mr Dillon also said detailed submissions would be made to the political parties before the June elections on issues such as extending the areas of disadvantage, reduction in animal disease levies and the IFA's opposition to development charges by local authorities.