IFA blockading of businesses totally unjustified

Meat Industry Ireland (MII) has said that today’s IFA blockading of businesses is an irresponsible and completely unjustified stunt. Disrupting normal business operations and harming the livelihoods of associated service providers does nothing to help the market situation.  

It is just two days since the first meeting of the Beef Taskforce.  Every effort is being made to address the many actions in the Irish Beef Sector Agreement. Yet, the IFA has chosen to undermine this process by engaging in this illegal blockading activity. This is not giving the taskforce due time. This and further threatened blockading activity are an expression of internal farm organisation politics playing out in the form of disruption of businesses. 

Contrary to comments by the IFA President this morning, the IFA knows that the Beef Taskforce cannot address price. This is a matter for the marketplace and individual processors. 

MII, on behalf of its beef processing members, engaged constructively in the meeting of the Beef Taskforce earlier this week and has since communicated to its members the strong views on current cattle prices that were expressed by farm organisations at the meeting.