Calf Imports...are we killing our own industry!!?

Bleating Lamb

Was talking to a 'clued in' vet at the wkd....I mentioned the new rush of calves been imported cos of supposed shortage of cattle here,and the genuine lack of governance on disease control linked to them.He said official Irish dept line is we cant stop importation even if we wanted to....cos of EU redtape...the vet shares my view that we are sitting on a ticking timebomb.....foot and mouth will have been small problem when we import far worse diseases in next few months/years....all for sake of a few thousand 'cheap' bucketfeds!!...he said they could bring in extended quarantine period...of say 6 months....that might put the businessmen behind the importers thinking about costs.

pakalasa

I think it's madness. I'm all for free trade and all that, but the bottom line is that we export 80% of the beef we produce, so the importation of these young calves is really only a short term thing. For two years, the most. By then irreparable damage could be done.

whelan1

are they even any cheaper than what we have here, also where can you aslaughter them?

5live

Bleating Lamb wrote: »

Was talking to a 'clued in' vet at the wkd....I mentioned the new rush of calves been imported cos of supposed shortage of cattle here,and the genuine lack of governance on disease control linked to them.He said official Irish dept line is we cant stop importation even if we wanted to....cos of EU redtape...the vet shares my view that we are sitting on a ticking timebomb.....foot and mouth will have been small problem when we import far worse diseases in next few months/years....all for sake of a few thousand 'cheap' bucketfeds!!...he said they could bring in extended quarantine period...of say 6 months....that might put the businessmen behind the importers thinking about costs.

If we ban the importation of calves we could also open up the banning of exports of weanling sucklers too. That would sort out the shortage of cattle fairly quickly. But, in fairness, something will have to be done about disease risks. If the importers were liable for the costs of the diseases brought in maybe....but we would have the same problem in exporting again:(

valtraman

i agree we will have our cattle health status destroyed also it is only 2 years ago we could not export enough calves not one thought of feeding them on and then sell them as an as an added value meat product . it is dead scary trying to produce beef at the moment with the price of stores and down the road early next year a flood of beef from these calves .
We dont need to ban imports we need to have proper quarintine to protect our herd health status that would reduce the flood to a trickle ,

milkprofit

Ban all imports on health grounds
Quarininte waste of time

Farmer Pudsey

milkprofit wrote: »

Ban all imports on health grounds
Quarininte waste of time

We cannot ban becaues of EU free trade law. However it is pure stupidity we will bring in BLuetongue and Schemmberg disease, This is how we got Johannes Disease and BVD orginally If you had to Quarintine and test for all these disease'sit would put a stop to it, Also the people buying then need there head examimed, I for one will expect to see the mart highlighting forign cattle in the autaum as the factories will play Mollybaun when you have them finished

pakalasa

You know what's going to happen. Irish calves will die and their tags will be switched with these foreign calves. If there's a quick buck to be made, there's plenty of cowboys out there willing to have a go.

leg wax

whos to blame for this,i put it soley at the door of the greedy dairy farmers,if they just kept a eye on their own job they would not be so much over quota,this is going to keep going until 2015.

whelan1

leg wax wrote: »

whos to blame for this,i put it soley at the door of the greedy dairy farmers,if they just kept a eye on their own job they would not be so much over quota,this is going to keep going until 2015.

agree with you....

munchkin_utd

pakalasa wrote: »

I think it's madness. I'm all for free trade and all that, but the bottom line is that we export 80% of the beef we produce, so the importation of these young calves is really only a short term thing. For two years, the most. By then irreparable damage could be done.

im in germany the past 10 years.

During the boom (when in Ireland building houses in the wrong place with cheap credit was the core of the economy and multi billion industries of tourism and food were let go to the dogs) there was little to no Irish beef/ Lamb to be found anywhere no matter how hard you searched for it.

since 2008 though its changed completely and now even the discount supermarkets are selling vacum packed irish steaks - clearly marked and promoted as premium Irish beef (from lucious meadows etc etc.) with a premium price to boot.

Its taken a long time for Germans to get over the whole BSE thing - (i.e. I'm still not even allowed to give blood in Germany as I studied in Northern Ireland in the late 90s!!!) - so it'd be an awful pity if the government didnt keep their eye on the ball and let this become a threat to what must now be a right little earner for the irish beef export industry.

JohnBoy

Bleating Lamb wrote: »

.he said they could bring in extended quarantine period...of say 6 months....that might put the businessmen behind the importers thinking about costs.

I get why we cant stop the import now, but that certainly makes sense.

lock them up and test the living daylights out of them.

Bleating Lamb

I would be in the sheep end of things.....dont think we should be dividing farmers though blaming Dairy men...they only see possible more yo yos at end of cheap calves.I THINK THE IFA SHOULD GET THE FINGER OUT and highlight to Govt/consumers that we are bringing in cheap trouble.

Would hate to look back on this thread in a few months/ years time with us all eating imported 'safe' beef!!
SO IF DEPT 'SPIES' OR IFA HEADS ON HERE....wake up and smell the roses.

flatout11

how many calves are imported??

rancher

Bleating Lamb wrote: »

Was talking to a 'clued in' vet at the wkd....I mentioned the new rush of calves been imported cos of supposed shortage of cattle here,and the genuine lack of governance on disease control linked to them.He said official Irish dept line is we cant stop importation even if we wanted to....cos of EU redtape...the vet shares my view that we are sitting on a ticking timebomb.....foot and mouth will have been small problem when we import far worse diseases in next few months/years....all for sake of a few thousand 'cheap' bucketfeds!!...he said they could bring in extended quarantine period...of say 6 months....that might put the businessmen behind the importers thinking about costs.

Would you ever get into the real world, what do you think a 6 month quarantine period would do to our weanling trade to Italy. We can't have one rule for us and a different one for everyone else, It's well known that our badly weaned and stresssed calves are giving plenty of problems in Italy with viruses etc

pakalasa

"David Graham, programme manager with Animal Health Ireland (AHI), said Ireland, as an exporting nation, needed to take a balanced view on livestock imports.
quarantine
He said herd owners should avoid imports unless absolutely necessary. Mr Graham advised farmers who were importing animals to get as much information as possible about the health status of the herd of origin"

From;
http://www.independent.ie/farming/news-features/agents-deny-calf-imports-disease-risk-2921759.html

Grecco

Will the factories accept these animals for slaughter in 2 years time?? I doubt it very much.
Also will the marts accept them??

flatout11

pakalasa wrote: »

"David Graham, programme manager with Animal Health Ireland (AHI), said Ireland, as an exporting nation, needed to take a balanced view on livestock imports.
quarantine
He said herd owners should avoid imports unless absolutely necessary. Mr Graham advised farmers who were importing animals to get as much information as possible about the health status of the herd of origin"

From;
http://www.independent.ie/farming/news-features/agents-deny-calf-imports-disease-risk-2921759.html[/QUOTE]

the reality is we cant ban them and it would be determental to our own industry to do so - as we are heavily dependant on exports also however i would rather they came from the uk or similar country with standards similar to our own
at 3000 odd head it will have little impact on national beef production in 2 years time

Grecco wrote: »

Will the factories accept these animals for slaughter in 2 years time?? I doubt it very much.
Also will the marts accept them??

the labeling argurment for factories would appear to be on the basis of convienence, in reality i cant see the issue for marts or on what grounds they would exclude them.
at the end of the day what are our choices .... ban imports and therefore run the risk of being banned ourselves?? It aint a perfect world lads you gotta work grind out a living in it though!!!!

milkprofit

ban imports and therefore run the risk of being banned ourselves??
Total rubish Banning imports why would that impenge on banning exports

milkprofit

ban imports and therefore run the risk of being banned ourselves??
Total rubish Banning imports why would that impenge on banning exports

Bleating Lamb

[QUOTE=rancher;77449297]Would you ever get into the real world, what do you think a 6 month quarantine period would do to our weanling trade to Italy. We can't have one rule for us and a different one for everyone else, It's well known that our badly weaned and stresssed calves are giving plenty of problems in Italy with viruses etc[/QUOTE

Well rancher...(or are you a shipper in disguise)....at mo we arent sending many weanlings at all to Italy as they are too dear here....but regardless of that.1- We could easily bring in tighter controls on the imports.....and 2- its untrue to say Feedlots still suffering big losses...welfare scheme has made massive difference...and all the shippers(apart from you!)....admit that.

flatout11

milkprofit wrote: »

ban imports and therefore run the risk of being banned ourselves??
Total rubish Banning imports why would that impenge on banning exports

would you suggest a total ban on all livestock imports?

rancher

Well rancher...(or are you a shipper in disguise)....at mo we arent sending many weanlings at all to Italy as they are too dear here....but regardless of that.1- We could easily bring in tighter controls on the imports.....and 2- its untrue to say Feedlots still suffering big losses...welfare scheme has made massive difference...and all the shippers(apart from you!)....admit that.[/QUOTE]

Were you at any weanling sales last year, you'd have to be deaf not to notice the calves that weren't properly weaned, It's poor form if we can't depend on farmers to wean the calves properly and mind that export trade that we might need sooner than you think, also like you I think it is irresponsible to risk the health of our animals with imports,

Tipp Man

There is a hell of a difference between importing an animal with pneumonia and importing an animal with BVD, Johnes, Bluetongue and this bloody german name that i can't spell

Farmer Pudsey

rancher wrote: »

Well rancher...(or are you a shipper in disguise)....at mo we arent sending many weanlings at all to Italy as they are too dear here....but regardless of that.1- We could easily bring in tighter controls on the imports.....and 2- its untrue to say Feedlots still suffering big losses...welfare scheme has made massive difference...and all the shippers(apart from you!)....admit that.

Were you at any weanling sales last year, you'd have to be deaf not to notice the calves that weren't properly weaned, It's poor form if we can't depend on farmers to wean the calves properly and mind that export trade that we might need sooner than you think, also like you I think it is irresponsible to risk the health of our animals with imports,[/QUOTE]

Not many and rancher it was your lot around the ring that drove them crazy I did see a few bought two nice black limo's 290 kgs 540 euro last fall however after them two you all around the ring drove all the runners 160-300 kgs crazy especially if any poor farmer tried to buy them so the farmers who normally kept these weanlings over the winter couldn't sell them fast enough

1chippy

the few marts i went to last year, definately had a large percentage of animals that werent weaned. a lot of the lads looked at us sideways when i mentioned we had weaned. but thats really going astray of the main point.
Ban imports or not?
if we ban imports where can we send our exports, because in due time we would be banned from their contrys. but then again are we actually importing from countries that we are exporting to.
Has there been any studies or research on the viability of Ireland working like a closed herd. would it be possible for Ireland to only breed a number of animals that would satisfy our domestic requirements and still be able to finish and send out the excess in freezers, or would be only playing into the meat factories hands?
can anyone enlighten me?

rancher

Tipp Man wrote: »

There is a hell of a difference between importing an animal with pneumonia and importing an animal with BVD, Johnes, Bluetongue and this bloody german name that i can't spell

Legislaters won't see any difference when they look into import/export of live animals, ultimately it's down to farmers themselves to stop this importation, it's like drugs or prostitution, if there wasn't a demand it wouldn't be happening

rancher

[QUOTE=Farmer Pudsey
Not many and rancher it was your lot around the ring that drove them crazy I did see a few bought two nice black limo's 290 kgs 540 euro last fall however after them two you all around the ring drove all the runners 160-300 kgs crazy especially if any poor farmer tried to buy them so the farmers who normally kept these weanlings over the winter couldn't sell them fast enough[/QUOTE]

If you had checked any of my previous posts, you would see I'm a sheep farmer

flatout11

1chippy wrote: »

.
Has there been any studies or research on the viability of Ireland working like a closed herd. would it be possible for Ireland to only breed a number of animals that would satisfy our domestic requirements and still be able to finish and send out the excess in freezers, or would be only playing into the meat factories hands?
can anyone enlighten me?

we have the numbers to operate as a closed herd and for the most part we actualy do, however the question is do we want to?
to clarify my position i dont see the reason for calf imports except to satisfy short term demand andd turn a quick buck,
However its a necessary avenue for the pedigree industry, its argueable that the beef industry here (in terms of breeding) has benifited greatly from this over the years, so a total ban wouldnt necessarly be in the best interests of the industry as a whole

milkprofit

Bring them in in emberos less help problems
Wher will we export to when we have a few more diseases imported like johnes- strains of ibr etc that we imported in last craze
WE are an surrouend by water - closed herd we should be

Tipp Man

rancher wrote: »

Legislaters won't see any difference when they look into import/export of live animals, ultimately it's down to farmers themselves to stop this importation, it's like drugs or prostitution, if there wasn't a demand it wouldn't be happening

I agree - demand is leading this. Hopefully it will stop - calve prices seem to have dropped a bit

Tipp Man

milkprofit wrote: »

Bring them in in emberos less help problems
Wher will we export to when we have a few more diseases imported like johnes- strains of ibr etc that we imported in last craze
WE are an surrouend by water - closed herd we should be

Agreed completly

No need for this nonscense