A recent report from the European Court of Auditors (ECA) which found that expenditure under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) had failed to cut emissions from agriculture has continued to receive criticism in Ireland.

Following on from a rebuke from independent TD Michael Fitzmaurice yesterday (Tuesday, June 23), one of the country's leading farm organisations has added its voice.

The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association (ICMSA) has said that "those expressing shock and horror" at the failure of CAP spending to lower agri-emissions "obviously misunderstood the purpose and function" of the policy.

ICMSA president Pat McCormack said: "CAP was never envisaged or designed to lower agri-emissions and is now being repurposed in a very crude and, we would argue, ineffectual way to incorporate that aim.

"CAP was designed to ensure the supply of superb-quality food to then-EEC [European Economic Community] consumers in the decades after the Second World War," McCormack highlighted.

He claimed that direct payments under CAP functioned as "a subsidy...allowing retailers to systematically underpay the farmers for the food the retailers then sold on to consumers".

According to the ICMSA president, this "dual purpose" is the delivery of high-quality food and high environmental standards "at artificially low prices".

"[We] have pointed out on numerous occasions before that you cannot have both. You can either have low food prices and low environmental standards or high prices and high environmental standards," he highlighted.

"But you cannot have cheap food and high environmental standards," McCormack insisted, asking in conclusion: "Can everybody get their heads around that?"