Mart sales resume after national ban lifted
DINGLE Mart will be back in business this week following a brief interruption caused by the government’s announcement on Friday that marts, along with an extensive list of other businesses nationwide, were being ordered to close down to help prevent the spread of coronavirus.
The mart already had a very effective system of social distancing in place before the blanket shut-down order, but following a government rethink on the ban on marts it will now resume sales on two days a week with new operating procedures designed to ensure there is no contact between farmers, staff and buyers.
Mart Manager Neilus McAuliffe explained that under the new regime farmers will contact the mart with a list of what animals they have for sale and they will be given a specific time when they can come in, one-by-one, to deliver their animals on specified sales days. The mart will then ‘package’ the animals that are for sale to fill orders received from buyers, with the mart acting as an honest broker between seller and buyer.
Cattle will be sold by weight at the market rate with the mart deciding on the price categories to ensure a fair deal for both buyer and seller. The value of calves will also be decided by the mart – “I’m valuing calves with 32 years, I know the value of them by now,” said Neilus.
Cllr Seamus Cosaí Fitzgerald, who farms suckler cows and sheep in Glens, said the social distancing solution being put in place at Dingle Mart would go a long way towards alleviating pressure on farmers who need to sell animals at this time of year.
He said dairy farmers were most at risk from an interruption of mart sales because they have a lot of suck calves at this time of year and they have to be sold within a few weeks of being born because most farms aren’t set up for keeping them. However, he said dairy farmers will continue to be under pressure because of falling milk prices in a depressed world market.
The mart sales solution will also take the immediate pressure off beef farmers who need to sell forward stores at this time of year. However, he added that beef farming which was already unprofitable will suffer even more from a fall in the price of beef prices, brought about partly because of the closure of Burger King and MacDonalds fast food outlets.
Only sheep farmers are able to ride out the coronavirus pandemic relatively unscathed. Their main season for sales is from November to February, which gives time for the worst effects of the coronavirus to have passed.