The Irish Farmers' Association's (IFA) sheep chairperson, Adrian Gallagher has strongly criticised the "shortsighted and unnecessary cuts" factories have applied to hogget prices over the past number of weeks.

According to Gallagher, prices have been cut to between €8.80/kg and €9.00/kg up to weights of 23kg.

"This level of price cut is unacceptable and cannot be absorbed by sheep farmers who have invested in having hoggets available for factories to service key customers at a critical and expensive time of the year," he said.

The IFA said that supplies are back significantly year-on-year, and that the number of export plants last week (week 11) was 47,902, compared to 61,248 in the same week last year.

“We are approaching the peak demand period over the coming weeks with the end of Ramadan, followed by the Eid al-Fitr Muslim festival, and Easter Sunday coming on April 20, when factories will have no choice but to secure hoggets to service important customers," Gallagher said.

The IFA sheep chair believes that farmers should not be misled by "unfounded negativity from factories and their agents on sheep markets". 

“Demand over the coming weeks will exceed supply and factories must reflect this in the prices and weights offered for hoggets,” he concluded.

Yesterday, (Wednesday, March 19), Agriland reported that this week’s factory beef price quotes saw some outlets increase their base-price offering for prime cattle by as much as 30c/kg.

Also this week, sheep factories have pulled their lamb (hogget) price by up to 20c/kg.

While Irish ‘all in’ beef prices are still 20-30c/kg off the €8.00/kg price mark at the higher-end of the trade, the latest data from the Livestock and Meat Commission (LMC) shows in the week ending Saturday, March 8, the average R3 grade steer price in Scotland was just under €8.00/kg (7.98/kg).

With up to 30c/kg added to Irish beef price quotes this week and up to 20c/kg cut from Irish lamb price, the differential in beef and lamb price is now less than €1/kg in some cases.