The president of the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association, Mr Pat O'Rourke, yesterday came out in support of IFA farmers who had disrupted trading in Dunnes Stores during the week to protest at what they claimed was below-cost selling of imported milk.
Speaking at the annual general meeting of the organisation in Limerick, Mr O'Rourke said he "fully understood and supported the actions of individual farmers last week and in the future".
The farmers had targeted nine of the company's stores around the State by filling and then abandoning trolleys full of food at check-outs in protest over its selling of two litres of imported milk for 99 cent.
"I am now calling on the Tánaiste, Mary Harney, to carry out an investigation into the action of Dunnes to determine whether or not there is a breach of the Groceries' Order by Dunnes and other stores.
"I maintain that that the Competition Authority, which has been quick to threaten legal sanction against farmers, should investigate whether there is abuse of their dominant position by some retailers." Mr O'Rourke used the occasion - the first a.g.m. of a farm organisation since the announcement of details of the Common Agricultural Policy reforms - to attack Teagasc, the agriculture and food development authority, over its positive assessment of the impact of decoupling.
The ICMSA had opposed full decoupling - that is, breaking the link between production and direct payments - and Mr O'Rourke said Teagasc should stop lecturing farmers and instead come up with meaningful answers on how to restore profit in agriculture.
"Teagasc, funded by the taxpayer and whose employees enjoy security of employment, benchmarked salary increases and secure pensions, have told us recently in a press release there is a good living to be made without premia from beef production if farmers adopt the management practices which they, Teagasc, have developed," he said.
"That would be a great story, and indeed a recipe for the future of beef production in this country, if it were true. Unfortunately it is not, and the Teagasc view is completely confounded by their own published figures.
"Teagasc had failed miserably to show how farmers could increase their profits and there was a danger that other EU countries would not opt for full decoupling and Ireland could not compete in beef markets," he added.
A spokesman for Teagasc last night said Mr O'Rourke had misinterpreted its analysis of the outcome of the CAP reforms.
"Irrespective of what options other member-states adopt on decoupling, the Teagasc analysis showed that beef production in Ireland will fall and beef prices will be higher than if there were no change in policy," he said.
Mr O'Rourke said dairy farmers should be given access to direct shareholding in the Irish Dairy Board, Bord Bainne, which is now controlled by diary co-operatives.
"I am convinced that centralised marketing is vital for Irish dairy farmers, but I also want to see dairy farmers directly benefiting both in terms of the income generated by the Irish Dairy Board and the wealth of the IDB co-op."
He welcomed the decision of the Government to carry out a full review of agriculture, including farm incomes, to fulfil commitments under the Sustaining Progress partnership agreement.