This is the third consecutive week that Ireland has used the market support measure. Last week, between 18 and 24 July, Irish processors placed 430t into intervention. The week before, between 11 and 17 July, some 351t was put away, meaning some 781t has been placed into intervention since 11 July.

The week before that Ireland put away 1,054t.

So far this year some 242,228t of SMP have been placed into public intervention at fixed price by European dairy processors, with Ireland contributing 29,159t to that amount.

This figure is in sharp contrast to the 1,843t of SMP put into intervention by Ireland in 2015.

Although Ireland is one of the top users of intervention for SMP in 2016, it is still outdone by the heaviest users France, Germany and Belgium.

At the end of June, the Commission raised the intervention limit for SMP in response to a bad year for dairy prices.

Butter

After a quiet two weeks, Ireland placed 2,751t of butter into private storage between 11 and 17 July. So far this year, Ireland has placed 4,069t of butter into private storage.

As part of its last dairy aid package announcement, the EU Commission extended the intervention period for SMP and private storage aid schemes past 30 September 2016 until February 2017.

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