Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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219. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the outcome of the recent Council of EU Agriculture Ministers regarding the need to provide market supports for the dairy sector; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [49064/14]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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At the Council of Ministers meeting held in Brussels earlier this week, I expressly called on the Commission to consider all possibilities to stabilise EU dairy markets. In so doing, I emphasised the importance of deploying these measures both at the right time and at price levels that positively support the market. It is my contention that while the positive underlying dynamic of increasing global population and demand remains, Irish and EU dairy farmers are vulnerable and acutely affected by temporary but significant market pressures. In such circumstances, instruments such as Aids to Private Storage, Intervention, Export Refunds and Exceptional Measures are designed to deal with periodic temporary troughs in price. These tools should be deployed, at the appropriate time, to ensure that they have maximum effect and that they place a real floor under the market, should that be necessary in the New Year.

Private Storage schemes for butter, cheese and SMP have already been introduced by the Commission in September in a move which I both advocated and welcomed. The Schemes have been extended to the end February for butter and SMP. The Private Storage scheme for cheese has been discontinued due to overuse by non Russian ban affected countries. Furthermore the commencement date under which intervention will be available in 2015 has been advanced to January 1st.

These steps already taken by the Commission, some of which have been utilised in Ireland , are certainly welcome, but all possibilities, including a targeted export refund mechanism, or potentially an increase in the intervention rate, need to be considered. In the context of Private Storage schemes, it is critically important to retain some flexibility around the release date to allow for market conditions.

The Commission remains vigilant, and has indicated that the relevant tools are available and can be deployed without delay if needed .