Shorter deal on butter?

Press, 9 May 1984, Page 1

Shorter deal on butter?

staff correspondent Brussels New Zealand will be asked to consider a shorter agreement on butter access to the Common Market after the failure of Agriculture Ministers to agree on a five-year deal. Opposition from Ireland again blocked agreement when E.E.C. Commission proposals were discussed yesterday. These provided for an 83,000 tonnes quota this year, going down to 75,000 tonnes in 1988. But the Irish Agriculture Minister, Mr Austin Deasy, said the most he would agree to was a two-year quota fixed now. This represents some concession by the Irish who until yesterday had insisted on quotas being set annually. Mr Deasy told NZPA, “We’d go along with two years for the sake of good will.” The Commission’s proposal for a five-year agreement was “far too gener-

ous,” he said, adding, “They should have stuck to a three-year regime.” The Farm Ministers’ failure to reach agreement means that New Zealand has again to settle for a two-month roll-over of butter sales to Britain to the end of July. It also means that Mr Deasy will be in the chair when the issue comes up again for discussion at the Agriculture Ministers’ meeting in July. Ireland takes over the E.E.C. presidency from France for six months at the end of June. New Zealand had hoped the butter question would be resolved during the French presidency. Compromise proposals put forward by West Germany and France were considered at yesterday’s meeting, but they made no headway when the British Agriculture Minister, Mr Michael Jopling, told his colleagues he would not accept anything but the E.E.C. Commission proposals for a

five-year deal. Mr Jopling and the Dutch Agriculture Minister, Mr Gerrit Braks, objected when the chairman, the French Agriculture Minister, Mr Michel Rocard, wanted to put the German proposal to a vote. The Agriculture Council decision on the butter quota has to be unanimous. Mr Jopling said the German proposal was for New Zealand quotas to be fixed for three years. After that there would be a “gentlemen’s agreement” by nine of the E.E.C. members — excluding Ireland — that they would not reopen the quotas set by the E.E.C. Commission under the present proposals. It would be left to Ireland to reopen the quotas if it wanted. Mr Jopling said the French proposal was similar except it did not suggest E.E.C. members give any undertakings on quotas after the first three years. One of the absurdities of

the situation was that if Ministers had reached agreement on something it could not be imposed on New Zealand, Mr Jopling said. This is because New Zealand has linked agreement on butter with an extension of the Sensitive Markets Agreement on sheepmeat which expired at the end of March. New Zealand will not sign until it gets what it wants on butter. Mr Jopling said “This is obviously a great lever New Zealand has on the European market.” Under the Sensitive Markets Agreement, New Zealand restricted its lamb sales in France and sold none in Ireland. Mr Deasy acknowledged that, with the expiration of the agreement and a new one not yet signed, there was nothing to stop New Zealand putting lamb into Ireland. “That’s one of the calculated risks or gambles you have to take in politics,” he

said. “It’s a consideration, yes, but something we have to live with.” He did not think New Zealand would do this. Ireland had nothing but good will towards New Zealand, he told journalists. Mr Jopling said after the meeting that the E.E.C. Commission would now have renewed discussions with New Zealand. The Minister of Overseas Trade, Mr Cooper, who visited all the E.E.C. capitals to put New Zealand’s case before this week’s meeting, heard about the Agriculture Council’s failure to reach agreement when he arrived in Bahrain from Saudi Arabia yesterday. “Obviously I’m disappointed we haven’t yet convinced the Agriculture Council of the need for a five-year agreement,” he told NZPA. “We’re still in a negotiating situation.” He hoped New Zealand was not going to be frustrated by a further rollover.