It is baffling that the EU has approved the merger of Slaney and AIBP today (a 50% takeover) when you consider that just a few years ago they refused Ryanair permission to take over Aer Lingus. The people in Brussels appear now to have little regard for the thoughts of Irish farmers and their repesentatives, when opposition is being forgotten about and the meat factory competition is becomes less and less with every big deal.
The only way to take on these factories is live exports, but maybe the EU will try to block this as well. The price of cattle in factories is not sustainable at moment and still the EU are giving the go ahead to mergers that are reducing the choices for farmers even further when they are selling. It time we woke up to the EU project and make decisions for ourselves or we will be closed down here in Ireland by history repeating itself. It is like the landlords of old and It is time that it is stopped.