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Shop local, stay poor
Read more about: Agriculture and Rural, Economy 
The headline:
“Buying imported food a traitorous act, guide claims”
to which the story doesn’t really add anything.
This is just a representative manifestation of the Buy Irish, shop local, self-sufficiency good, imports bad sort of protectionist nonsense – like the outcry over Christmas shopping in Newry – that sends my blood pressure through the roof.
I’m not going to go into huge detail as to why this is. It’ll only turn into a rant, and a boring one at that. I’m just going to note a few simple figures:
Ireland exports 90% of its beef cattle
Ireland exports 75% of its dairy produce
In 2008, the value of Irish agricultural exports was 8.1 billion euro.
So, wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone were to develop a healthy contempt for foreign food? That way, we can keep all that lovely, locally produced food for ourselves, and our trading partners can keep their filthy 8.1 billion.
CJ,
What should really send your blood pressure into the stratosphere is the way this old cant gets a hearing politically, and action, and calls for further action, all in the name of a narrow protectionism and the preservation of anti-competitives prices, standards and trading practices.
It is somewhat baffling to me that the dairy and meat industries haven’t made more of an effort to directly inform and involve the consumer.
Each farmer should upload what they have sold and how much they got for it and who (which supplier or supermarket) bought it to a dedicated site, and then they should note the price being charged to the consumer for it. Do this continuously not every few months and let the public see who is screwing us most and people might choose to shop accordingly.
If you were paying €15 per kg to a supermarket ans could see that the producer was only getting €2.50 while another supermarket was charging €15.5 per kg but giving the producer €3.50 you might think about paying that extra 50c. It’s just an idea, call it transparentshopping.ie.
CJ,
You’re right to highlight the level of exports. I’ve a little bit of knowledge of food production (especially meat) and to be honest the best of Irish beef etc gets exported. I get so fed up of this buy local crap as we are only provided with the stuff that doesn’t get exported, which is of inferior quality.
Also, something that is probably worth looking into is the level of foreign produce sold in local shops – which claim to sell Irish food. For example, at christmas, Italian turkeys were less than half the price of the Irish turkeys. This is because the cost of slaughtering a turkey in Ireland in a certified plant is astronomical, but also because the producers are creaming off money. Quality aside, in a time when shops are struggling to survive, I suspect that they are buying foreign, for cheap, passing it as Irish, and making a few pound extra. I’ve no problem with it, but shops pass it as Irish and sell it at Irish prices – that gets my goat.
The only way to protect Irish food is not to encourage people to buy it, it is to relax the extremely harsh laws on food processors and manufacturers. Therefore reducing price and getting Irish food on a par with imported produce.
Agreed tho, that unpatriotic crap is a little excessive.
@CJ: While I can’t really disagree with the thrust of your argument when it comes to agriculture in general, but what about horticulture? Aside from grain growers, horticulture is pretty much the agricultural cinderella in this country, and it’s just a wee bit ridiculous that in Carlow town of all places, the Tesco there is selling scallions from Chile!
CJ,
I am not going to check out the content that you object to. I will take your word that it is emotive and lacks balance. There is no place for emotion in economics. The “invisible hand” of the free market is rational and dispassionate- apologies for the cliche.
However the debate about buying Irish needs a sensible balance.
1.Ireland’s economy is too open , due partially to industry and trade mismanagement and short sighted policy making. We dont have any more than a couple of weeks food in the country to feed our population if war or global pestilence cut us off.
2. The Irish economy leaks cash like a holey bucket. The hole in the bucket is imports revenue and foreign retail income flooding out. To the extent that stimulus packages which are fairly effective in closed economies like Germany and the US would be useless in Ireland and in fact would lead to faster cash outflow as we spend faster.
3.One reason we import so much is because we dont produce appropriate to our own needs. This is because De Valera’s efforts at self-sufficiency or the Agrarian model failed due to economies of scale issues. Thereafter successive govts from Lemass onwards pursued the FDI strategy almost to the extent of discounting productivity improvements in either industry or agriculture.
4. We now spend much more on food and retail imports than we gain from food and retail exports IF you leave out the MNCs ( whose Irish exports are often only a paper exercise anyway).
5. The open economy model needs balancing out not to move the country back to self-sufficiency or to be patriotic in our purchases but if niothing else to offset our reliance on export revenue.
6. Imports are so costly to the Irish exchequer and revenues leaving the country thanks to foreign supermarkets, building materials, oil, motor trade so high that there is little point in the govt lowering VAT because those who would gain most would also take most money out of our economy.
7. These are MACROeconomic arguments which mean little to consumers, citizens, endusers. THEREFORE what is needed is policy making to create a productive climate and enterprise that can compete on the value proposition. Protectionism wont work, emotive talk and shamrocks on the bag wont work. Policy making to nudge the invisible of the rational free market in our direction WILL work.
It seems that the Celtic tigers disease has spread to the farming sector – build a housing estate or a domestic version of a hotel in a little village in Kerry (to hell with the scenery) and you had everything going for you, apply to build a modest bungalow to have your children near you and every obstacle is put in your way. Similarly in the food sector the small enterprise is being squeezed out of the market while the multinationals can do what they like. It is that simple!