Aug 13th, 2009

Dairy farmers accuse Minister Smith of 'dereliction of duty'

The President of ICMSA, Jackie Cahill, has accused Minister Smith of complete dereliction of duty in refusing to support the growing movement of member states demanding action on the catastrophic collapse of the EU dairy sector. Mr Cahill said he has written to the Taoiseach demanding to know why Ireland is standing idly by while resistance grows to the Commission's dairy policy that is resulting in an unprecedented destruction of dairy sector right across the Union.

Mr Cahill said that, as of today, no less than eight member states - including both France and Germany - have officially and jointly rejected the Commission's proposals to continue expanding quota and have demanded a freeze on any further expansion and increase in the level and scale of intervention.

According to the ICMSA President, the Minister and the Department's fundamental commitment to the Irish dairy sector must now be openly questioned. He said it was significant that for the first time in this dairy crisis, seriously-minded ministers have formally put forward proposals to raise the dairy intervention prices. This would actually bring about an increase in the price paid to farmers as opposed to merely halting the collapse in income. However, Mr Cahill said that for reasons best known to him, our Minister has decided to stand outside this group. Furthermore, these dissenting ministers now support increasing the scope and scale of export refunds which are vital to the Irish dairy sector.

Mr Cahill pointed out that Minister Smith and New Zealand would appear to be the only two parties on the global dairy scene who favour a globalised and unregulated, 'big bang', type production of milk. Even in the United States, where the sector in is the process of early slaughter to reduce milk production, the dominant opinion now - agreed by all major dairy organisations - is that there must be production control, which effectively means a quota system of the type the minister is so intent on dismantling here and across the EU.

The ICMSA President stated that his organisation's contacts in Europe had told him categorically that were Ireland to signal a change in position and join the 'club of eight', it would represent a decisive development in forcing through a change in quota policy at Commission level, which is the news that 20,000 dairy farmers are waiting for on a daily basis.

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