Francis O'Brien (Fianna Fail)

I wish to share my time with Senator Ellis. I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Tony Killeen. It is great to see him in such form and fighting fit. We all wish him well. I welcome the opportunity to discuss this urgent issue affecting the agriculture sector. The Minister is working so hard for the dairy sector but these are difficult times with milk prices as low as 20 cent per litre.

I welcome the decision taken at last Friday's management committee in Brussels for the common organisation of agricultural markets. The committee decided to increase export refunds for butter, skimmed milk powder and whole milk powder and to accept into intervention all quantities of butter and most quantities of skimmed milk powder offered while maintaining the intervention purchase price.

The Minister said the milk market situation would be discussed at next Monday's Agriculture and Fisheries Council meeting and that he would press hard for the prolongation of the public and private storage schemes which are due to end in August. He also intends to press for the removal of anything that would block the export of cheese products outside the EU and for a more aggressive level of support for the export of butter products. The dairy industry is of huge benefit to the Irish economy with exports worth in excess of €2 billion.

Following the Minister's consistent intervention, the European Commission has, since the beginning of the year, restarted a range of support measures to help stabilise the dairy markets to support the export of dairy products outside the EU and has signalled its intention to put a floor under the market. This is truly an exceptional market situation and an appropriate response is warranted.

There is scope for further action and at this week's EU Agriculture and Fisheries Council, the Minister pressed the European Commission on a number of fronts. In addition, there is greater scope for exports of dairy products outside the EU and more attractive export refunds which would greatly improve the export potential of the EU and which would be of great benefit. The Taoiseach contributed to this important debate and the fact that it took place at all is an indication of the seriousness with which the issue of milk prices is now being taken right across the EU.

There is no doubt farm families are under serious financial strain. The key issue for the Irish dairy industry currently is to get the dairy markets back on track. This can best be achieved by enacting all the support mechanisms available under the Common Agriculture Policy. To that end, I welcome the steps taken by the Commission so far to stabilise the situation and I encourage it to continue its efforts to stabilise and stimulate the market even further. As was said, dairy farmers face a serious situation and are probably losing money producing milk. I am delighted to speak on this motion.