P.M. optimistic about E.E.C. butter deal

Press, 15 February 1984, Page 2

P.M. optimistic about E.E.C. butter deal

NZPA staff correspondent Paris The Prime Minister, Sir Robert Muldoon, says he is optimistic that agreement can be reached between New Zealand and France on the controversial issue of butter and lamb imports to the E.E.C. “I have some optimism we will get agreement on this before very long,” he said, after talks in Paris with the French Agriculture Minister, Mr Michel Rocard, “We are not too far apart.” ( Mr Rocard is chairman of the E.E.C. Agriculture Council which will tackle the butter quota again at its February 27 meeting. “I think we made some progress,” Sir Robert said, after their talks. “But we have not got agreement with him on behalf of the French Government.” France and Ireland have been blocking accord on the

83,000-tonne butter quota proposed by the E.E.C. Commission for this year as part of a new five-year agreement. Butter is continuing to enter the United Kingdom under a two-month roll-over arrangement which runs out at the end of February.

Sir Robert said there was some hope that Mr Rocard would be able to make a proposal to the next council meeting which would be acceptable. “But we are not yet at a stage that what he would like to do and what we would like to do are identical,” he said.

France has wanted to link the butter and sheepmeat issues. Sir Robert said there was no objection to this as long as New Zealand got a reasonable deal on both.

“There is no suggestion of a trade-off,” he said. But he still had to talk to the Irish Government which

wants to see a cut in imports of New Zealand butter and lamb.

He hoped to make some progress with the Irish Prime Minister, Dr Garret Fitzgerald, and the Agriculture Minister, Mr Austin Deasy, when the saw them in Dublin tomorrow. Sir Robert said that it would be not only premature but “perilous” to talk publicly about quantities being discussed at this stage.

Mr Rocard, who is due to visit Wellington later this year, was well disposed to New Zealand, he said.

Sir Robert is attending a special meeting of Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Ministers which opened in Paris on Monday. He told NZPA he was not expecting too much from the meeting. “My interest is to see the extent to which it can be made to support what we

are doing in the Commonwealth initiative on trade and payments generally, which is my principal task,” he said.

“If we can get any support from this meeting, so much the better. I am not expecting too much out of it.”

Sir Robert planned to speak on his proposal for a new Bretton Woods-type conference at yesterday’s session.

The two-day meeting, suggested by the French Finance Minister, Mr Jacques Delors, has been described as the O.E.C.D.’s first attempt to act as a “think tank” with Ministers discussing long-term strategy rather than concrete policy issues. Sir Robert said after the opening session that discussion had been “interesting and quite frank.”

“But there were no new truths revealed,” he said.