Falklands: Abattoir debate resurfaces
The decision by the Falkland Islands Executive Council, and approved by the Standing Finance Committee, to provide additional financing of £1 million to the Falkland Islands Meat Company (FIMCO), has not been without controversy.
The additional funding, which also came with some strings, was explained saying that FIMCO is facing increasing challenges on the global meat market and the additional competition by other international meat sellers. And in order to retain and attract to new market conditions, FIMCO is also working towards full British Retail Consortium (BRC) and Halal Food Authority (HFA) accreditation.
However Gerald Cheek an Islander with a prodigious memory and experience, wrote a letter in the Penguin News saying that with “the benefit of hindsight, given the fact that the Ajax bay Abattoir failed back in the 1950`s, why did we go and build another one?”
Likewise Brian Rowlands, in another comment wrote, “at what point will someone in government admit that it has never been, and probably never will be profitable to export meat? Why are the 1000 odd Falkland islander tax payers , paying tens of £millions for foreigners to eat meat subsidized, by them ?”
However, Margaret Goss points out that “Brian Rowlands and farmers getting paid peanuts for their carcasses,… this day and age we should be looking at more than £10 or £15 for a wether carcass,…without the FIMCO abattoir many farms will go broke, but it needs scaling down, more money goes into wages than the farmers bank A/C ,forget about export set up a unit that produces pet food and fertilizer then it would see some profit.”
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