Allister repeats case for export refunds
19 December 2008
Further efforts have been made this week to convince the EU Commission of the case for re-introducing dairy export refunds.
Jim Allister MEP said,
“As feared, December’s auction result confirms just how difficult the World dairy market situation is, averaging 16.63 pence per litre.
“This week, I received a response from Commissioner Fischer-Boel in relation to my request for the immediate re-introduction of export refunds. The Commissioner notes the decreasing milk prices in most regions across the EU. Furthermore, she acknowledges the ‘extremely difficult’ situation for Northern Ireland dairy farmers in particular, due to its dependence in mainly exporting whole milk powder.”
“However, the Commissioner has revealed the reluctance of a large majority of Member States towards accepting bids for export refunds for butter and skimmed milk powder, as demonstrated at November’s monthly Management Committee meeting. Furthermore, the Commissioner believes -wrongly in my opinion -that the use of export refunds in current conditions could actually worsen trading conditions, with the abundance of supply on the world market, and little prospect of refunds assuring additional demand.”
“I have reiterated to the Commission the need for urgent corrective action to be directed towards putting a floor back into the market, with history showing that export refunds best serve this purpose. Clearly, steps to address the current exceptional market difficulties should be taken before the Commission discovers that intervention ceilings set for butter and skimmed milk powder to be woefully inadequate. Such a course of events is likely to happen if the dire trading conditions persist until intervention re-opens in March. I have tabled a Parliamentary question to this effect.”
ENDS
