TWO SEPARATE groups have told a Dáil committee that the revival of the sugar beet industry would create jobs, eliminate imports and play a key role in Ireland’s economic recovery.
Members of the Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine expressed their support for the revival of the industry and were widely critical of the decision to exit the sector.
In 2006 Greencore controversially closed Ireland’s last sugar plant, in Mallow, with the loss of 320 jobs, following EU sugar policy reforms. It said the changes to the sugar regime would result in unacceptable losses. The company and beet growers were compensated for exiting the sector.
However, in 2010, a report by the European Court of Auditors found that the closure of the factory was needless because the business was profitable at the time. It also noted that it cost more to close the business than it would have to continue running it.
There is now a possibility of re-entering the sector as the European Commission has signalled its intention to end its quota system at the end of 2015. However, some countries are lobbying for the continuation of quotas past this date.
Beet Ireland, which described itself as a group of farmers and people who made their living from the land, told the committee that sugar-beet growers were “unanimously positive” about redeveloping the sugar industry.
Its chairman Michael Hoey, of the Country Crest food company, said the State was spending €200 million a year importing sugar. The Beet Ireland plan envisages an investment of €400 million in a facility which would produce sugar and bioethanol.
“It is estimated that 2,000 growers will supply sugar beet to the facility,” Mr Hoey said. The plant would employ 250 people directly and 500 during construction. It would also provide 2,000 jobs indirectly in areas such as transport, logistics and machinery manufacture, he added.
The committee also heard from the Irish Sugar Biorefinery Group, which is led by former Greencore executives and other former executives in the Irish sugar industry.
Its chairman Chris Comerford, a former Greencore chief executive, said the revival of the industry could result in 5,000 jobs. The group is proposing building a sugar and ethanol plant on a new site in the southeast, at a cost of about €350 million. The plan also envisages the involvement of 2,000 beet growers.
They would produce 154,000 tonnes of sugar a year, “close to the total imports into the 32 counties of 160,000 tonnes annually”.
Mr Comerford said it was hoped that 30 per cent of the finance to set up the plant would come from investment and the remaining 70 per cent would be a debt “which would be repaid in full over the initial years”.
Noel Coonan (Fine Gael) said it had been suggested that Mr Comerford’s group was a front for British Sugar. He also asked if the former Greencore and Irish Sugar executives had learned anything from the demise of the industry.
“We’re not a front for British Sugar, we’re not a front for anybody,” Mr Comerford said. “Nobody on this side of the table was involved in the closure of the industry.”
He also said the group was willing to work with Beet Ireland to advance the plan.
Committee chairman Andrew Doyle said its members would work with their colleagues in Europe to see if plans to re-establish the industry could be progressed. He also encouraged farm groups to support Ireland’s case in Europe.
Mr Doyle said there must be scope for Ireland’s re-entry to the sector, given that it had been producing just 1 per cent of the EU sugar quota when it exited the sector. Minister for Agriculture Simon Coveney has previously said he would support the revival of the sugar industry if it made financial sense.
