IFA seeks €106m to compensate sugar beet growers

The Irish Farmers' Association yesterday demanded €106 million of the €145 million compensation available should the sugar industry…

The Irish Farmers' Association yesterday demanded €106 million of the €145 million compensation available should the sugar industry close down under an EU restructuring plan.

The organisation, which represents the 3,700 Irish sugar beet growers, produced a Deloitte report which said growers face a total loss of €150 million because of the EU reforms.

Part of that reform is expected to be the closure of the last Irish sugar plant operated by Greencore at Mallow, Co Cork.

IFA president Padraig Walshe, who will meet Minister for Agriculture Mary Coughlan and Greencore management on the issue today, said the findings made an incontrovertible case for the payment of this sum to farmers who will lose their livelihoods.

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"It is now a matter of political will to determine the allocation of the €145 million of EU funds available to the Minister for Agriculture in the event of closure," he said.

He said it was not farmers but the Irish Sugar company and the EU which was closing down the industry here and for that reason farmers were morally justified in looking for what is almost 75 per cent of the compensation available.

Peadar Jordan, chairman of the IFA's national beet growers' committee, said beet-growing was often described as "the dairy cow" of the tillage industry because of its profitability.

"In the long history of beet growing here stretching back to the 1920s, farmers have perfected the growing of sugar beet and invested heavily in its development," he said.

"Now, we are being forced out by the action of the Irish Sugar company which, without reason or consultation, closed down the factory in Carlow which was its premier plant and best suited to service the processing of the crop," he said.

"Why should this company be paid the compensation when its main interests and shareholders are abroad living outside this country?" he asked.

Mr Walshe explained that as part of the deal agreed in Brussels, the Minister for Agriculture had negotiated a compensation fund of €43.5 million for farmers over the next four years.

He said that subtracting this figure from the €150 million which the report assessed as the beet growers' total loss, the deficit was just over €106 million which should go to the growers.

The Deloitte report, he said, indicated that beet growing would become unprofitable for farmers from 2007/2008 onwards.

IFA general secretary Michael Berkery said beet farmers would lose EU entitlements if beet was not grown this season and he hoped the Minister would use the fund available to her to support farmers in growing the crop so those entitlements would be secured this year.