Cavalier attitude to livestock quarantine is putting our entire food industry at risk
The upside of getting shat and peed on in milking parlours and lambing sheds, and generally mucking around in nature for a living, is a bulletproof immune system. So Irish farmers don’t need to be over-worried about Covid 19. For a bit of perspective, bear in mind that 200500 people die in Ireland from flu in an average year.
The bigger threat from a farming point of view may well be the knock-on impact on prices from the self-imposed lockdown that is now affecting the daily lives of a fifth of the world’s population.
Irish meat exporters tell me that their Chinese customers have as many as five ships queuing up outside ports waiting to be unloaded.
The Chinese population have been stocking up on non-perishables, so Irish steaks and roasts are not high on the shopping list.
Pig prices that hit record highs in 2019 have experienced their first downturn in 18 months. Admittedly, it’s only a 4pc decline in prices, but that could be the start of something bigger.
One way or another we have huge exposure to the Chinese market. On the dairy side, it’s our third largest on the back of the huge demand for infant milk formula. It takes over 40pc of our infant milk formula, which accounts for a large portion of the €550-600m that Irish dairy exports have been achieving in recent years.
So Irish dairy farmers can park any hopes of price increases over the coming months. How much of a price fall is in the pipeline is anyone’s guess.
Much will depend on how much of a grip the disease gets in Europe, but the hope has to be that rich countries in the West can throw resources at this new disease to dampen its impact.
Irish pork is even more dependent on the Chinese market. While the 59,000 tonnes that we export there only accounts for 0.1pc of the Chinese market, it equates to a massive 20pc of our pork output.
Despite all the hype about the amount of beef that China would be taking from Irish farmers by now, it turns out that they account for little more than 5pc of our output.
However, the bigger implication of a fall-off in Chinese demand is the knock-on impact of the discounted Brazilian beef that gets redirected from bunged-up Chinese ports to other outlets such as Europe.
But there may be other food for thought for farmers wondering about the fall-out from Covid 19.
We live in a globalised world, and nothing short of quarantine will stop diseases moving everywhere humans go.
While any suggestion of quarantining people would never work, why do we take such a cavalier attitude to the welfare of our livestock industry?
We are possibly the best positioned country in Europe to ensure a diseasefree status for all our animals. Despite our natural advantage in this regard, Ireland gave up its quarantine requirements on January 1, 1994 in the interests of free trade.
Within two years, we had Johne’s disease, quickly followed by warble flies, Foot and Mouth, and Schmallenberg virus. These diseases gave us a fair idea of how fast the livestock world can grind to a halt.
Earlier this year, a mink-like animal called a sable was detained in Cork with a suspected case of rabies. The last time we had to deal with that was 1913.
Why does Ireland feel the need to throw its borders open when other EU Member States, like Sweden, insist on maintaining quarantine periods?
I was surprised to find that we imported nearly €318m of live animals last year. But a massive 93pc of this consists of breeding and performance horses, with about €241m coming from the UK.
I estimate that there is only about 3,500 horses involved, which values the average horse imported here at close to €100,000. At that kind of money, it should be possible to issue thoroughbreds with individual health status passports that would allow them to still travel to the UK and France.
Is there any farm sector that would suffer seriously if Ireland went back to its requirement for a six-month quarantine period for everything else?
The fear is that it would trigger a trade war with countries that have traditionally exported animals to Ireland.
But does it make sense to put our multibillion euro livestock industry in the line for the sake of €20m of cattle, sheep, pigs and poultry imports?
The bigger threat of Covid 19 to farming may be the knock-on impact on prices