Famine food ‘facts’ don’t add up
The “food” which Ireland exported both before and during the Famine was mainly oats. Oats, as Dr Johnson famously stated in his dictionary, are “usually given to horses”. In the contemporary period the preparation of oats for human consumption took four to five hours. Oats were used in some of the workhouses, and the flax growing area in the North, but It is doubtful whether the average Irish farmer would have had either the knowledge, or the means, of rendering them palatable.
One also wonders what the likes of Shane Minogue would be saying now if the British had only supplied the starving Irish people with food which, in that period, was “usually given to horses”.
Both before and during the Famine, Ireland was exporting and importing significant quantities of wheat. The reason for this is that there are two types. The bulk of the wheat grown in Ireland then, as now, would have been winter wheat. This requires a mild damp climate. It is sown in the autumn, and is only suitable for feeding cattle. The wheat used for bread-making is known as spring or hard wheat, and requires harsh winters and hot dry summers. The presumption, therefore, is that Ireland was exporting the winter wheat which it grew best, and was importing the additional amount of spring wheat it needed for bread-making, as it does today.
In 1844, the year before the Famine, Ireland exported 94,000 tonnes of wheat and 314,000 tonnes of oats, and imported 23,000 tons of wheat. Net exports: 385,000 tonnes.
In 1847, at the height of the Famine, Ireland exported 39,000 tonnes of wheat, and 98,000 tonnes of oats , and imported 199,000 tonnes of wheat, 12,000 tonnes of oats and 682,000 tonnes of maize. Net imports of 756,000 tonnes, a change of 1,140,000 tonnes. The country lacked the milling, the baking, and the transport infrastructure needed cope with the change in the diet of almost half the population. The maize had to be milled twice.
Given the exceptional circumstances, that the response was inadequate cannot be denied. But how much more could have been processed is open to question.
The suggestion, often made elsewhere, that the problem could have been easily solved by ceasing all “food” exports lacks credibility, and Shane’s statement that “Ireland was actually a net exporter of food” is directly contradicted by the facts.
Allen HP Crosbie
Merville
Cobh
Co Cork
