On Tuesday, both the IFA and the ICSA met European Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development Phil Hogan, as well as Breffni Carpenter from the Department of Agriculture in Brussels. They also met with Irish MEPs on Tuesday evening. The role of Irish food, and in particular Irish beef, played a significant role in the talks.

Standards

ICSA president Paddy Kent said Ireland’s livestock sector is vulnerable from the threat of trade deals with larger trading blocs.

“We have to defend EU standards of food production. Our farmers cannot compete with industrial scale production units in North or South America and it is clear that the livestock sector is very vulnerable to trade deals, particularly in the context of Brexit,” Kent said.