Ireland-Cattle going to plants in the north.

IRELAND-Deliveries of slaughter cattle from south hits northern prices

Paying extra for 15% of the cattle they process has enabled beef processors in Northern Ireland to force down the value of the remaining 85%, according to cattle farmers.

This is why northern processors have imported more than 1,000 head per week across the border from the south, said National Beef Association Northern Ireland chairman Oisín Murnion.

He said the adverse sterling-euro exchange rate made the cattle at least as expensive, and in many cases more expensive, than those available in the North. "We know that UK processors have been trying for weeks to resist rising slaughter cattle prices and after spotting this surge in imports, cannot help concluding they have decided that the Northern Ireland market is open to relatively easy manipulation through the importation of cattle," said Mr Murnion.

"It would appear that it is worth paying well above the odds, in sterling terms, for 15% of cattle processed, if the extra numbers make it easier to force down the value of the remaining 85%."

Cattle farmers had been puzzled by inexplicably low slaughter cattle values in Northern Ireland, despite tight regional supplies of finished cattle, and a 25% year on year rise in retail beef prices.

However the Livestock and Meat Commission in Northern Ireland has confirmed that January and February deliveries of slaughter cattle from the south had increased by 60% compared with the same time last year. And at the end of March, 1,080 head, amounting to 15% of Northern Ireland’s total prime cattle throughput, were imported in just one week — despite the unfavourable currency exchange rate.

"This is bad news for feeders in Northern Ireland who have struggled for the last 12 years with the lowest prices paid in the UK. It is also bad news for mainland finishers because the increase in beef taken from cheaper cattle in NI puts a drag on the value of their own stock," the National Beef Association spokesman said.

"Beef farmers in the Republic of Ireland are also angry at the heavy discounting of their cattle at a time when their own supplies, and those in the UK, are so tight and have concluded they too are victims of an organised attempt by companies with plants in both the UK and the ROI to play off the two national markets against each other, thereby pulling down the price of beef cattle in both countries."