The Strategic Banking Corporation of Ireland (SBCI) is searching for partners to roll out the €150m low-interest loan scheme announced in the 2017 budget last month. Loans with an interest rate of 2.95% will be available to farmers in 2017.

“The SBCI will be putting out a call in the next number of days for strategic partners to roll out the loan fund,” said Minister for Agriculture Michael Creed.

He added that he has spoken to a number of Irish banks that are in support of it.

Minister Creed was speaking at a visit to Dairygold’s cheese manufacturing facility in Cork, where Norwegian dairy co-op TINE plans to build a new facility to manufacture Jarlsberg, Norway’s best-known cheese brand, for export to Europe, the US and Australia.

Norwegian agriculture minister, Jon Georg Dale, also visited the proposed new site and planted a tree there to mark the occasion.

Dairygold has been manufacturing Jarlsberg Cheese, on behalf of TINE, at its own cheese production facility at Mogeely since 2013. Production at the new plant is expected to commence in 2019.

“We have ambitious plans to grow our Jarlsberg exports and this will require high standards of commitment and quality which Dairygold has always demonstrated,” TINE chair, Trond Reierstad said.

TINE SA is Norway’s largest producer, distributor and exporter of dairy products with an annual turnover of 22.2bn Norwegian krone (€2.4bn).

It is a cooperative owned by more than 11,000 Norwegian dairy farmers who deliver 1.4bn litres of milk.