Farming in NI: Are beef cattle numbers at their lowest level for 55 years?

• In 2016 there were almost 270,000 beef cattle in Northern Ireland and in 2025 that number was around 214,000 – a drop of 21%.
• Official figures on beef cow numbers indicate there were particularly large dips going into 2018, 2019 and 2023-25.
• The current total number of beef cows is lower than in any year since 1970.

During a 23 March debate on agricultural support payments in relation to Areas with Natural Constraints (ANCs), Sinn Féin MLA Declan McAleer claimed:

“The evidence is clear: over the past decade, output from ANCs has been in steady decline. If that trend continues unchecked, the consequences will stretch far beyond upland farms and will, ultimately, threaten the long-term sustainability of the red meat sector in the North. Figures from the 2025 DAERA census paint a stark picture: the number of beef cattle has fallen by 21% over the past 10 years, with a particularly sharp decline since 2018-19, when the ANC scheme was discontinued. The North now has its lowest beef cattle numbers in 55 years. During consultation on the Bill, many stakeholders pointed to the end of the ANC payment as a contributing factor to that trend.”

There are three aspects to this claim:

1. The number of beef cattle has fallen by 21% over the past decade.
2. The decline since 2018-19 has been particularly sharp.
3. Northern Ireland has its lowest number of beef cattle in 55 years.

All of these are supported by evidence.

Agricultural census data indicates that between 2016 and 2025 the total number of beef cows in Northern Ireland went from 269,746 to 213,744 – a drop of 20.8%.

Figures from 2018, 2019 and 2023-25 indicate particularly large reductions in beef cattle year on year.

Historic data published in 2011 by the researchers at the Northern Ireland Assembly, combined with DAERA data over the past couple of decades, provide evidence that the number of beef cattle in Northern Ireland is at its lowest level for 55 years.

Read on for more information, including some discussion about what this does and does not say about farm subsidies aimed at supporting those with more difficult or disadvantaged land.

• Source

FactCheckNI contacted Mr McAleer about the claim. As well as last year’s DAERA census, mentioned during the MLA’s contribution, Mr McAleer pointed us to a 2011 publication from the Assembly’s Research and Information Service (RaISe).

He also provided us with several further statistical observations about beef cattle numbers in Northern Ireland and how they have changed over time. One of these observations was that:

“It would appear that the post 2016 loss in beef cow numbers is steeper. There were 269,700 in 2017 and 226,000 in 2024 – a 16.2% decline in 8 years.”

This is slightly different to the second aspect of the claim where he suggests such a decline has occurred since 2018-19 (note that the numbers mentioned above are accurate, further details are below).

• Areas with Natural Constraints

The numbers raised in this claim were brought up during the debate for the second stage of the Areas with Natural Constraints (Payments) Bill, a Private Member’s Bill tabled by Mr McAleer (who himself is a farmer) that seeks to re-implement a subsidies scheme aimed at helping farmers operating on more difficult land.

The Areas with Natural Constraints scheme was designed to provide “a payment to farmers with land in the Severely Disadvantaged Area (SDA) to compensate for all or part of the additional costs and income forgone related purely to the constraints for agricultural production in the area”.

The ANC scheme was wound down after 2018. In terms of cattle, its payments focused on beef rather than dairy cows (as well as breeding ewes, breeding female goats and, depending on their age, breeding female deer).

In 2020, then Agriculture Minister Edwin Poots told the Assembly around 485,000 hectares of agricultural land was classified as being within “Severely Disadvantaged Areas” – just under half of all NI farmland, “concentrated mainly in the mountain areas of Mourne, the glens of Antrim, the Sperrins and most of Fermanagh” – and mostly involves beef and sheep farmers.

• Agricultural census

The Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) conducted a census last summer. Findings from the survey were published in December.

The survey found that the number of beef cows in Northern Ireland in 2025 was 213,744.

In 2015, this figure was 260,325 (with the number actually higher in 2016, at 269,746) – meaning that in the following decade there was a 17.9% drop in the number of cows compared with 2015, but a 20.8% drop compared with 2016.

Although the claim is out by a year, it is still basically fine to suggest that the number of beef cows has dropped by 21% in the past decade.

• Rapid drop?

What about the suggestion the drop has been rapid since 2018-19?

Total herd numbers for every year since 2005 are outlined in the graph below:

Figure 1 – source: DAERA census

As is clear, 2016 represents the most recent peak in beef cattle numbers – given that the number was higher that year than in the previous year, and also higher than every year since. The precise numbers are below:

Figure 2 – source: DAERA data

In the ten years noted above, the largest – of several percentage points, relative to 2016 numbers – occurred in 2018, 2019, and 2023-25.

This is slightly different than the details of the original claim – noting once more Mr McAleer’s observations in his email to us that a significant decline began in 2016 – but it is still more or less appropriate to suggest that “a particularly sharp decline” has taken place since 2018 given which years have seen the largest drops in beef cattle numbers.

It’s also worth noting that all these figures are cited in the context of the removal of ANC payments and, while these subsidies continued into 2018, the announcement that they were to be discontinued was actually made at the end of 2016.

• Historic data

The third aspect of this claim is that current beef cattle numbers are the lowest they have been in 55 years.

As can be seen in Figure 1, above, the 2025 numbers are lower than in any year since 2005. What about before that?

A 2011 briefing paper from the Assembly’s Research and Information Service (RaISe) shows that total beef cattle numbers were 190,800 in 1969, increasing to 220,600 in 1970 (i.e. above the current level) and have stayed above the current level in every year since.

This provides evidence to support the claim that current beef cattle numbers are the lowest they have been in 55 years.

The number of beef cows in NI in each year since 1960 is laid out in Figure 3, below:

Figure 3 – source: RaISe paper

• Farm payments

It is important to note that these numbers should not be taken as direct proof of the effectiveness or non-effectiveness of the ANC payments.

Farming subsidies are a complex matter that have undergone vast changes in the past decade or so, with these changes still being rolled out. Brexit meant that the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy no longer applies in Northern Ireland (note that ANC payments have continued in the EU, with indications that this will carry on in 2027 and beyond).

Currently, reforms are underway to move agriculture towards the new Farm Sustainability Payments (under DAERA’s Sustainable Agriculture Programme) amongst other supports – such as the Beef Sustainability Package, aimed specifically at beef farmers, including both the Beef Carbon Reduction Scheme and the Suckler Cow Scheme.

It is also worth noting that the agricultural sector has seen increases elsewhere. Figure 1, above, shows a clear increase in dairy herd numbers, while the 2025 DAERA census also shows that pig and poultry numbers are both higher than at any time in the past five years.

Meanwhile, based on Figures 1 and 3 above, it appears that beef cattle numbers have broadly been declining since 1998 (when they hit a peak of 344,704), while the second highest recorded number since 1960 was actually in 1974 (339,051).

Agriculture overall has a complicated web of qualified supports depending on the specific circumstances of individual farms. Working out the suitability of those subsidies in general requires a detailed analysis that goes far beyond the scope of this fact check.