Irish farmers should face facts and prepare for an end to the live cattle export trade, Green MEP Ms Patricia McKenna said yesterday.
She was speaking in the wake of a major rally by the Irish Farmers' Association in Ennis, called to protect the live trade. The EU is preparing new regulations covering the transport of animals, limiting journey times to nine hours followed by a 12-hour rest period.
The most controversial new proposal is that animals in transit must remain on their vehicles for the duration of their journey, a move which has united farmers and opponents of the live trade in their condemnation. Yesterday Ms McKenna told farmers they would have to face reality and that the trade for live exports was about to come to an end.
She said farmers' fears about monopoly practices and price-fixing in the meat processing industry needed to be addressed.
"Politicians have avoided dealing with meat factory practices and pricing, but sooner or later these issues will have to be addressed," she said.
"In the long term it will be much more beneficial for Ireland to export carcasses or finished meat products rather than animals on the hoof."
Ms McKenna, who has drafted a report for the Environmental Committee of the European Parliament on the new regulations, said it was totally unacceptable that animals be kept on trucks for the duration of journeys, including rest times.
"This aspect of the proposal is unacceptable to all sides. It means animals enduring hot, cramped conditions on stationary trucks where experience shows it is difficult to water them and impossible to clean out manure. For this period to be considered 'rest', animals must be unloaded."
Protecting the live export trade was the single biggest challenge for the Minister for Agriculture and Food, Mr Walsh, during the Irish EU presidency, the IFA rally was told by its president, Mr John Dillon.