Milk quota to be separated from the land

By Des Maguire and Paul Mooney

THE Department of Agriculture is understood to be preparing to separate milk quota completely from the land from April 1 next, in the most radical overhaul of the milk quota regime ever.

The Department is also understood to be considering introducing further curbs on private milk quota leasing and sales next year as part of the overhaul of the regime.

The objective is to get dormant producers who own around 88 million gallons of quota to put their milk into restructuring rather than into leasing. However ring-fencing measures will continue in the Disadvantaged Areas for some time to ensure that there is not an outlfow of quota from the disadvantaged areas.

Milk quota will be pooled for sale at co-op level through a restructuring type system and channelled to designated priority categories. The quota will be allocated at a capped price with priority to producers who have made regular use of temporary leasing and special provisions for new and recent entrants.

Previously the Department only considered a partial breaking of the link between land and quota within specific regions and asked the EU Commission on a number of occasions over the past few years to facilitate this.

The Commission repeatedly refused to give the go-ahead to this but the AGENDA 2000 agreement allows for a breaking of the link between land and quota to improve the structure of milk production.

The Journal understands that the Department intends to use this provision of the Berlin agreement to free up the quota regime. The Germans have already signalled their intention to do so and to ban all new leases from April lst next.

Separating the land from the quota will bring down the price of both quota and dairy farmland and should make more quota available to active producers.

However it should also help to prepare dairy farmers for the eventual abolition of milk quotas. There has been increasing speculation in Brussels that the milk reform part of the Berlin agreement may not hold as originally decided last March when it comes up for review in 2003.

A position paper from the Department will be presented to a meeting of the Milk Quota Review Group on Monday September 20 next but no firm decisions are expected to allow for a further period of consultation. Decisions are expected to follow in the autumn.

SRM levy gone

A decision to abolish the SRM levy of £3 a head on cattle as soon as possible was taken by the Irish Meat Association this week.

The decision has been welcomed by Minister Joe Walsh and IFA president Tom Parlon.

Joe Walsh praised his officials for their behind the scenes work in getting the £3 charge dropped.