Members of the board of the Agri-Food Regulator have expressed “concern and frustration” that the Government has not provided it with additional powers to force businesses to disclose price and market information for reporting purposes.
Chairman Joe Healy told Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon in a letter earlier this month that such additional powers were essential if it was to fulfil its function of addressing the lack of transparency in the sector.
The board had urged the former Minister Charlie McConalogue in a submission last September to provide it with additional powers after a number of retail business did not co-operate with it on a report on the supply of eggs.
In that submission, the board had recommended that the Minister introduce additional regulations as soon as possible, which would allow the regulator to compel businesses to provide price and market information as set out under legislation.
“The board are awaiting a formal response to the submission. At a meeting of the board earlier this week, the concern and frustration of members was noted as the lack of progress on this matter is resulting in the inability of the regulator to fulfil a core function relating to the publishing of analysis on price and market data along the agri-food supply chain.”
“The board remain strongly of the view that additional powers are essential for the regulator to fulfil its functions of addressing issues of lack of transparency and information asymmetry in the agri-food supply chain envisaged under the provisions of the 2023 Act”, Mr Healy wrote in a letter to Mr Heydon on February 19th.
Earlier this week, Niamh Lenehan, chief executive of the Agri-Food regulator, said the board had sought an urgent meeting with the Minister.
She told an IFA horticulture and potato growers' meeting it had not been possible to produce a planned report on price and market trends in the horticulture sector, as a number of businesses did not provide the requested data.
She said that as a result, a report on the horticulture sector using only publicly available data was now being finalised and would be published shortly on its website.
Addressing the meeting, Ms Lenehan said: “Similar to the regulator’s initial efforts to produce a report on the egg sector, the production of the envisaged horticulture report has not been possible as a number of businesses did not provide the requested data.”
“While we were pleased to see all but one of the contacted retailers and wholesalers engage with the regulator and provide data, a number of other businesses across the supply chain have not yet provided data. This once again highlights the need for the regulator to be granted additional powers to compel businesses to supply the necessary data so that we can fully deliver on our remit.”
