Chinese market ‘wobble’ is bad for Tipperary, says ICMSA

The chairperson of Tipperary ICMSA has warned that what was already a fairly daunting challenge for the local farming and agri-food sector is about to become steeper.

Thurles farmer Seamus Troy was talking as local analysts and agri-pundits digested the impact of the recent turmoil on world stock markets and the devaluation of the Chinese currency.

On the latter, Mr Troy was unambiguous: “It is bad for Ireland and particularly bad for Tipperary - the State’s second biggest milk producing county.”

Mr Troy said: “The feeling in ICMSA is that the strengthening of the euro will damage us insofar as even over the last year when milk price have fallen considerably, we were - to an extent – being thrown a lifeline by the currency bonus derived from food and agri-exports being paid for in Sterling and dollars.”

However, he said that as the euro strengthens against those currencies in particular, we’ll lose that bonus in a situation where we’re still not seeing the Commission, or the Government, wake up to the need to either help European milk producers or tackle the blatant margin-gouging by the supermarkets

“That’s going to be a problem. From the Tipperary point-of-view, it’s not looking very positive. The Chinese economy is going through a wobble and it looks unlikely that demand for premium imports like our baby formula will climb as the rate that our most optimistic analysts forecasted.

“There’s no sign of any thaw in the Russian attitude to their ban on EU imports and the other leading emerging markets, like Brazil, seem to have become tentative as well,” he said.

Mr Troy said the milk price situation was increasingly looking like it would have to be worked through and in those circumstances Tipp’s farmers needed - and had a right to expect – sensible and flexible decision-making by the Department.

That was not what they were getting, he maintained, before going on to instance an example from just last week of what he termed “an obvious decision taken too late to make any difference”.

While welcoming the announcement of an extension to the closing date for the Farm Safety, Dairy Equipment and Sheep Handling Scheme under TAMS II from August 31 to September 14, Mr. Troy said that this decision should have been taken weeks ago and certainly not within the last week before the original closing date.

“ICMSA has sought such an extension for the last number of months and we repeatedly highlighted the problems on farms in terms of completing the work against the original unrealistic deadline.

“So while we appreciate the extension we’re also obliged to point out that it’s been obvious for months that an extension was needed, but the Department was absolutely adamant that no such extension was going to be considered and that announcing the two-week extension just four-odd working days before the original closing date was slightly ridiculous.

“Farmers and contractors were already working non-stop to meet the deadline and in the circumstances where we’re all urging farmers not to rush tasks and run health and safety risks then this kind of last-minute announcement isn’t helping matters at all and runs counter to sensible policy and not giving people a chance to plan safely and sensibly. Many individuals throughout the county who were very interested in the schemes were actually put off doing the work altogether because they didn’t think they’d make the original deadline. ICMSA acknowledges the extension but it is profoundly disappointing that the obvious need for an extension was ignored until last Wednesday – four days before the original closing date. These scheme are hugely important to Tipperary and this problem was obvious for a very considerable time, so the decision to extend should have been taken weeks ago,” said Mr Troy