U.K. Minister discloses Community dumping

Press, 11 May 1984, Page 6

U.K. Minister discloses Community dumping

NZPA-AAP London The European Economic Community was storing or dumping millions of dollars of fruit and vegetables to keep shop prices high, the British Agriculture Minister, Mr Michael Jopling, has told the House of Commons. He also revealed that the Soviet Union and other Eastern bloc countries were buying Community food surpluses at bargain prices. In 1982 the Community had paid £B6 million compensation to farmers to get rid of their surpluses rather

than sell them, he said. The “Daily Mail” newspaper reported that thousands of tonnes of tomatoes, pears, apples, mandarins, lemons, and oranges had been dumped. An estimated 50 per cent of 70,700 tonnes of lemons had been destroyed or spoilt, so had 79 per cent of 347,440 tonnes of peaches, and a quarter of 122,210 tonnes of pears and 76 per cent of 56,560 tonnes of tomatoes, it said.

Mr Joplin said that no figure was available on how much produce had been destroyed but the amount taken

off the market had represented about 2.3 per cent of E.E.C. fruit and vegetable production. Large amounts of food had been exported to Communist bloc countries at cheap prices to save the cost of storage. In nine months last year the Soviet Union and other East European countries had bought 6,850,000 tonnes of wheat, 1,386,730 tonnes of barley, and 1,245,330 tonnes of sugar. There also had been large shipments of malt, butter, beef, veal, pork, and poultry.