Special reunion of EU-Agricultural ministers scheduled for 5th October – Furthermore Sarkozy, Merkel and Barroso announced to take care of catastrophic situation of dairy market  - if political promises are not kept, delivery stop will start again

Brussels/ Hamm 24.09.09: „The politicians are moving. We will pause with one aspect of the farmers revolution – we will pause the delivery stop for now. If there are not serious and clear political decicions being taken to overcome the catastrophic situation of the dairy market, we will immediately start again.“, says Pascal Massol, President of the French APLI. „Contracting is not an acceptable political decision“, he adds. The President of the EMB, Romuald Schaber says „The dairy market needs a flexible volume regulation at European level; it needs the balance of demand and supply to guarantee fair prices for farmers and consumers.“ In Germany, Belgium, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Austria and Italy the dairy farmers also are going to start delivering milk again, because of political confirmations on national and European level. „The milk will be delivered again, but the protest actions will continue in our countries“ says Daniel Condat of the French OPL.

Being confronted with the milk delivery stop in eight countries and the strong actions of protest of the European dairy farmers several heads of government, such as the German Chancellor Merkel, the French President Sarkozy as much as the President of the European Commission Barroso had announced to commit themselves to find an effective solution for the milk situation. Sarkozy has announced in public that a regulation of the dairy market as much as of other agricultural markets be necessary. Furthermore a special reunion of the EU-Agricultural ministers concerning the milk price crisis is scheduled for 5th October.

In the last two weeks European dairy farmers have not delivered 500 million litres of milk to the dairies. The dairy market has already reacted. Prices on the spot markets increased. Some dairies have started to pay higher producer prices. It is expected that the volume reduction undertaken by the dairy farmers in the last 14 days will result in an increase of the producer prices in general.

Now political decisions corresponding to the EMB-demands towards a flexible volume regulation are necessary. „We say it very clear again: The political talks of the upcoming days and weeks have to have serious results. If they do not, the revolution of the farmers will increase and the component delivery stop will be part of it once again.“, Pascal Massol reinforces the position of the European dairy farmers.

Contact:

France - Pascal Massol (APLI): 0033/670517303
and Daniel Condat (OPL): 0033/6 07 08 62 40
Germany (BDM) - Romuald Schaber: 0049/15155037174
Belgium (MIG) - Erwin Schöpges: 0032/497904547
Luxemburg (LDB) - Fredy de Martines: 0035/2691998831
Austria (IG-Milch) - Ernst Halbmayr: 0043/6649249635
The Netherlands (DDB) - Sieta van Keimpema: 0031/612168000
Italy (APL) - Roberto Cavaliere: 0039/335 635 6361