At the last auction, the remaining 162 tonnes of skimmed milk powder out of the 380,000 tonnes initially held in public stocks were sold, thus exhausting all stocks bought and managed by the European Commission, the Commission said on Friday 21 June (see EUROPE 12179/18).
After the dairy market crisis of 2015-2016, the Commission purchased 380,000 tonnes of skimmed milk powder between 2015 and 2017 as part of a public intervention aimed at stabilising the market and supporting farmers' incomes.
From the end of 2016, the Commission opened a monthly and then bi-monthly auction process to gradually return these stocks to the market without disrupting it.
Phil Hogan, European Commissioner for Agriculture, welcomed the fact that the results of the Commission's actions were “higher prices and a stable market”. This operation also illustrates the necessity and effectiveness of the instruments of the common agricultural policy, he justified.
Public stocks are now empty and the price of milk has risen considerably, from 26 cents per kilo in the summer of 2016 to 34 cents per kilo in May 2019.
The 14 Member States that stored skimmed milk powder were thus able to empty their stocks.
Full details of the tendering procedure can be found on the website of the European Milk Market Observatory: https://bit.ly/2icGmCL (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)