The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association (ICMSA) has said that questions have been raised about the grading and pricing systems operated by some beef factories.

The comments following the publication of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) Beef Carcase Classification and Price Reporting Annual Report for 2025.

The report contains data on the Irish beef industry and shows different trends that have been materialising over the past decade.

ICMSA

Responding to the report, the ICMSA has claimed that the "failure" to supervise grading and data collection in some beef factories is "likely costing farmers millions".

Chair of the ICMSA Livestock Committee Michael O'Connell said that the report shows several DAFM-approved beef factories are exempt from mechanical classification and price reporting which he said is "so alarming".

"Over the past few weeks and months, the subjects of traceability and transparency have been the first subject farmers talk about wherever they meet and the core principle that farmers feel has been violated is the one that says that you must have the same rule for everybody," he said.

"There must be full transparency from all meat processing plants on how they report pricing and carcase classification," he added.

O'Connell claimed that six beef factories out of a total of 35 DAFM-approved factories are not reporting prices to the department on a weekly basis.

“These factories are deemed to be slaughtering less than 20,000 cattle per annum accounting for a small percentage of the national kill, approximately 5.1%. But based on 2025 total throughput, we are still talking about 81,000 cattle.

"So this is not ‘just a few head’ and we have members who are part of processor sustainability programmes whose base price is based on reported prices paid or average quote prices published on farming media - if those 81,000 cattle prices per annum are not even accounted for, how does that affect farmer base price?

"These factories are, in general, independent processors who – again, generally - pay slightly more on a weekly basis than the ‘big players’ to source cattle because they don’t have factory owned feedlots or contracted feedlots.

"If these higher-paying factories are included, you should be seeing a positive shift in terms of base prices based on farming publications.

"Again, it is the Department who provides this information to the media and ICMSA thinks it must be a fully transparent system that’s based on the prices paid by all beef processing plants," he said.

Beef

The ICMSA Livestock chair said the report has also highlighted the number of inspections carried out and the number of carcasses checked in beef factories.

"During 2024, a total of 702 factories had carcass classification and grading checks versus 670 factory inspections in 2025. That’s not acceptable; it’s a reduction of just under 7,000 carcasses from what was already a very low number," he said.

O’Connell believes this report "shows no basis for farmer confidence in a system".

"A total of 55,569 carcasses inspected out of a total throughput of 1,592,861 is only 3.4% of the total. What about the other 96-odd%?" he asked.

The ICMSA Livestock chair said that "there needs to be full-time department of agriculture staff in each processing plant regardless how big or small".