ICSA president Sean McNamara said that the true test of the grass-fed PGI will be to see if it delivers “champagne” prices for farmers. Mr McNamara was reacting to comments by Minister McConalogue who described the grass-fed beef PGI as putting our beef on the same level as top protected European products like champagne.
“The grass-fed PGI has been a long time coming and it is now urgent that it delivers higher prices to farmers. A PGI reflects the very important work that farmers do, and it is they that should benefit from it.”
The ICSA president added that we also needed to see more urgency in delivering the suckler premium brand. This is going on for four years now and progress is painstakingly slow. It is not good enough – at the rate we are going there will be no sucklers left to benefit.”
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