Farmers hit out at grain price rate

Farmers hit out at grain price rate

16 July 2025

CEREAL farmers are currently being paid the same price for a tonne of grain as they received 35 years ago.

The startling revelation by the Farmers For Action (FFA) Steering Committee has been described as a major cause for concern with the farm gate price for a tonne of grain a maximum of £160.

FFA says the price farmers are being offered is an “intolerable situation”.

The group’s local representative, Ronnie Murphy, said it’s time for the truth about grain and oil seeds farm gate prices.

A cereal grower himself, Mr Murphy says that over time, the FFA has uncovered that the price of cereals around the world is controlled by a handful of huge world grain and oil seeds traders like corporate US Cargill and are all connected back to the Chicago stock market.  

“Farmers are consistently told that the world market dictates the price of grain and oil seeds and this is all part of ‘free trade’ but the truth is, this is ‘corporate controlled free trade’,” said Mr Murphy.

“During black Wednesday on the stock market when John Major was Prime Minister, the price of grain rose briefly for a day, then we had the Ukraine war erupt.

“This stopped Ukrainian exports for a short period and the price of grain rose for only a few months to around £300 per tonne and then down it went.”

Mr Murphy said Ukraine does not export the same amount of grain and oil seeds that it used to due to the ongoing war, yet the grain and oil seeds corporates managed to pull the price down to suit themselves.

In addition, he said around 2010 when bio-fuel was quite rightly being hailed as one of the great alternatives to fossil fuel, the grain and oil seeds corporates were starting to lose control of the grain and oil seeds market of food versus fuel.

Mr Murphy continued: “So they started telling governments around the world to cool-off on the bio-fuel use of grains and oil seeds, claiming that it would put up the price of food and, worse still, were listened to.

“The only way to break this armlock that grain and oil seeds farmers across the world find themselves in is for either the Northern Ireland Farm Welfare Bill to pass through Stormont successfully or a UK-wide Farm Welfare Bill to pass through Westminster, setting a precedent.”

Mr Murphy believes that if this was the case, barley, wheat and oats should be around £500 per tonne.

He said this would result in the world’s huge corporate fossil fuel companies and the Cargill’s that control the price of grain and oil seeds to legally be brought to heel.

“They would then start considering their children and grandchildren heading into accelerated climate change rather than their balance sheet,” suggested Mr Murphy.

“In short, if farmers across these islands and across the world were getting properly paid at the farm gate, they could produce the food and a huge chunk of the fossil-free fuel the world needs.”