Brittany Ferries will cease live animal exports to France from next month, a decision that has raised concern with the Irish Farmers Association (IFA).<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for the French shipping company confirmed the transport of live farm animals to France would end, but added that it would be making no further comment.<\/p>\n
IFA President Francie Gorman said he raised the issue with Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon today.<\/p>\n
In a statement, he said it was “imperative” that Minister Heydon and his EU counterparts ensure Irish cattle “continue to have unhindered access” to the Single Market.<\/p>\n
Mr Gorman said that while there are other carriers of livestock from Ireland, and other means for older animals, any contradiction in services to access the market for Irish cattle is a concern.<\/p>\n
He added that farmers in Ireland cannot have access determined by commercial decisions of ferry companies or any other service providers.<\/p>\n
Ethical Farming Ireland (EFI), a volunteer group that campaigns for improved conditions for farm animals, described the decision by Brittany Ferries as a “major victory for animals”.<\/p>\n
It said the move followed a sustained international campaign led by several NGOs.<\/p>\n
Executive Director for EFI Caroline Rowley said: “After over a year of campaigning we are delighted that the CEO (of Brittany Ferries) has finally made the principled choice to stop all involvement in this trade.”<\/p>\n
Fianna F\u00e1il MEP Billy Kelleher described the decision as a “disaster for the calf export industry”.<\/p>\n
He said the move “significantly undermines not just the calf export industry but Irish agriculture in general”.<\/p>\n
Mr Kelleher added that Minister Heydon “must be prepared to step in if the market fails to respond”.<\/p>\n
“Too many livelihoods are at stake,” he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brittany Ferries will cease live animal exports to France from next month, a decision that has raised concern…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":583428,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-583427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=583427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/583428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=583427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=583427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=583427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}