For the second time since the beginning of the year, no cases of BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy) were reported in the State last week to the Department of Agriculture, Food And Rural Development.
In veterinary terms, this is even better news than the fact that Ireland still has had only one case of foot-and-mouth disease and possibly can avoid having any more. The real problem is not foot-and-mouth: BSE is far more difficult because it has the potential to kill humans.
The latest BSE crisis began in November in France when a dealer sold cattle from an infected herd to an abattoir which ended up being sold to the public through the Carrefour supermarket chain.
Outraged French consumers turned their backs on beef. This incident coincided with a drive by the EU to establish exact levels of BSE in continental herds.
By early December, as more cases of BSE began to emerge, beef consumption on the Continent plummeted. In November consumption fell to 20 per cent of normal.
This weekend An Bord Bia, the Irish Food Board, was able to report that EU beef consumption was gradually getting back to normal after the BSE and foot-and-mouth crises.
It said the most recent EU official figures showed that towards the end of April total beef consumption was estimated to be about 18 per cent lower than corresponding 2000 levels.
It said Germany, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain continued to be the worst affected. German beef consumption was reported to be approximately 25 per cent lower than the traditional norm for this time of year.
This was a considerable improvement on the situation in November when German consumption was reported to be 80 per cent lower than normal. A similar story applied in Italy, France and Spain, where consumption was currently 20 per cent, 18 per cent and 15 per cent respectively lower than normal.
However, a problem remains, and while special destruction schemes have been introduced by the EU to reduce the quantity of surplus beef by 375,000 tonnes (1.1 million animals), there is still too much beef in Europe for uninterested consumers.
Ireland, which has slaughtered and destroyed 225,818 animals since January 10th, is still producing more beef than it can sell abroad. Its only real commercial market is in the UK where beef is now sold to the catering trade.
From July 1st the purchase for-destruction scheme, which paid up to 90p per lb for cattle and set a baseline for beef, is to end.
Unless Europeans consume more or Egypt, Russia and other countries, which have banned our beef since November, come back on stream, there will be a real problem in the autumn.
The PFD scheme is to be replaced by a new special purchase scheme which will deliver a much lower price per lb, but even in mainland Europe it has not been welcomed.
It looks as if Irish beef farmers are facing yet another miserable autumn when the uncertainty of beef prices will replace the difficulties they have faced since last March.