Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Russian ban on agricultural products from the EU came into operation on 7 August. Russia is the second most important destination for EU agrifood exports. These exports are valued at just under €12 billion based on trade in 2013 and the products covered by the ban are valued at more than €5 billion, representing 43% of the EU’s trade in agricultural products to Russia and over 4% of total EU agrifood exports.

The ban came on top of a series of other restrictions imposed by the Russian authorities earlier this year, including an EU-wide ban on pork due to an outbreak of African swine fever in Lithuania and an EU-wide ban on beef trimmings due to alleged adulteration of beef consignments with pork in certain member states. While beef trimmings from Ireland were banned, we were not one of the countries involved in the alleged irregularity. In addition, Russia imposed temporary restrictions on exports from Ireland of beef offal, dairy powder products and seafood arising from a series of routine audits. Two weeks ago - the week before I went to China - I had direct discussions with the Russian ambassador on that matter

The EU response to date has focused largely on the fruit and vegetables and dairy sectors, and the measures taken are as follows. Support for market withdrawals, green harvesting and compensation for non-harvesting for perishable fruit and vegetables has been put in place. There has been an opening of private storage aid for butter and skimmed milk powder until the end of the year. There has been an extension of private storage aid to certain cheeses. There has been an extension of the intervention buying-in period for butter and skim milk powder until the end of the year. There is a commitment to add €30 million to the existing EU budget for promotion programmes in 2015.

Additional information not given on the floor of the House.

The Baltic member states and Finland are acutely affected by the ban on dairy products and the Commission is under pressure to introduce a targeted compensation package. There is, however, an issue about the funding available for this and for any further measures that may be required. There is a proposal from the Commission to reduce the budget appropriations for agriculture in the 2015 budget. This is the subject of negotiation between the Council, European Parliament and Commission in the conciliation process for agreeing the EU budget for 2015.

At Monday’s meeting of the Agriculture and Fisheries Council an overwhelming majority of member states, including Ireland, called on the European Commission to reverse its proposal and to set aside sufficient funds to address the impact of the Russian ban and to address any other crisis or market disruption that might occur in the next year. Accordingly, the Italian Presidency has sent a letter from the Agriculture and Fisheries Council to the President of the ECOFIN Council to register the dissatisfaction of EU Agriculture Ministers with the Commission's proposal.

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