Using EU money to create a centre of excellence to drive innovation in the South American sheep sector has the potential to directly impact lamb producers in Europe, it has been claimed.
At a meeting of the Sheep Club last week, where AHDB Beef and Lamb hosted a delegation of French producers and their trade organisation Interbev, both nations expressed their dismay at the move.
They agreed that, at a time when the sheep meat production industry is looking for investment in research in Europe, it was unacceptable that EU money from member states is going out of the union to fund similar research in South America.
And they believe the investment in the Sheep Technology Centre, in Uruguay, represents a serious conflict of interest.
The Sheep Technology Center seeks to become an instrument to improve competitiveness, generating benefits in the sheep category (meat and wool), in Uruguay. The aim is to provide training, technical assistance, and highly innovative products and services.
However, the meat produced in Uruguay is in direct competition with that produced in Europe, something which both AHDB Beef and Lamb and Interbev point out disadvantages their own domestic producers of sheep meat.
“At a time when funding vital research in the UK and Europe could not be more important, it is difficult to understand how it can be the right decision for funds from European counties to be given to Uruguay to fund research into developing a more competitive sheep meat production industry that will then compete directly with European product on shelves in Europe and abroad,” said Stuart Roberts, chairman of AHDB Beef and Lamb.
“We would very much like an explanation so we can understand the rationale behind it, and so inform our own applications for European money to fund investment in our own sheep sector to the benefit of member states.”
The “technological observatory” will have a special focus on applied innovation, looking at best practice from Australia or New Zealand, in terms of sheep management.
The work complements the country’s “Earn more with your sheep” programme.
