Jan
26
An issue of Provenance
2010 | Filed under Perspective-Analysis | (0) 
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As Keith Smyton reports, the year just gone was a challenging one for pork producers across Northern Ireland, thanks in the main to the early year fallout from the H1N1 dioxin scare…
Doing business in 2009 was extremely challenging in the aftermath of the dioxin scare in the Republic of Ireland and the spill over into Northern Ireland and this exerted a tremendous economic pressure on consumer confidence when it came to the workings of the supply-chain.
The onset of H1N1 virus in Northern Ireland in September and the health coverage throughout the World was not unexpected, but yet another reminder that the industry should keep up its guard and its high biosecurity and welfare measures here in Northern Ireland.
Producers also faced high feed input costs, while processors faced a shortage of pig supply throughout the UK. This meant a firming up of pig prices in 2009 against a backdrop of tough market and trading conditions.
The local pork industry built up to its most intensive promotional period of the year from October through to Christmas. The Forum promoted National Sausage and Pork Weeks, the National Sausage Competition and the Northern Ireland Pork Celebrations road shows in more than 700 stores from ASDA, M&S, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Supervalu to local Spar and EuroSpar franchises. This consisted of everything from cookery demonstrations to tasting and sampling new products. These will continue through 2010 and it was clear that local consumers want the choice of local pork and pork products. This followed several months of activities to support Northern Ireland’s supply chains.
Ensuring consumers are fully aware of the provenance of pork and bacon products on sale throughout the province is a key focus of the Ulster Pork and bacon Forum in its ongoing celebration of the Northern Ireland Pork and Bacon marketing campaign which runs throughout 2010.
BEATEN
The year ended with an upbeat Christmas period, but the dioxin repercussions of last Christmas were never far away from anyone’s mind.
The Forum worked closely with DARD, DETI, Invest NI and DHSPSS on issues from private storage aid to the aftermath of the dioxin crisis to H1N1 Virus and pulling together a code of practice for the industry (producers and processors) and its front-line staff to combat the effects of the virus.
Labelling was also a major factor and we continue to work with industry and retailers to deliver for Northern Ireland Pork and Bacon products. We believe that if a code of practice had been in place throughout the supply chain, then the Northern Irish industry would not have suffered the vast losses during the dioxin crisis and the product could have been clearly identified. We continue to work to this end.
We have been actively working with primary industry, retailers and butchers through 2009 to deliver an effective strategy for our industry. We believe that consumers should have a choice and products which are supported by Northern Irish supply chains. A clear labelling policy should be agreed and we will work with our sister agencies throughout the UK to ensure that this happens. Indeed, this was a major focus of our 2009 Annual General Meeting.
Our ongoing marketing campaign is designed to showcase the huge range and versatility of Northern Ireland pork products as a whole, as well as quality, integrity, welfare and nutritional values of local pigmeat.
Northern Irish pig producers and processors take immense pride in their produce, they know its quality is exceptional and that consumers can have total trust in it.
That really is the key issue – buying local is an assurance of buying the best. There is considerable misconception in the market about what is ‘local’ and that’s what we are trying to redress. There are a lot of brand names and producers on the market that people think are local but they are not.
The only pork and pork products that consumers can be assured are genuinely Northern Irish and reared and processed to the highest health and welfare standards are those from the Ulster Pork & Bacon Forum producer and processor members.
Our aim is to ensure that consumers are aware of this and that retailers give genuinely 100 per cent local pork products the space and active promotion they so deserve on-shelf.
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