THE hard-pressed dairy sector was given some good news yesterday when European Union Commissioner for Agriculture Mariann Fischer-Boel announced yesterday at the Green Week conference in Germany that export refunds for milk were to resume.

Farming unions and other lobbies representing the dairy sector across the EU have been putting pressure on the Commission to reintroduce refunds for dairy products to help balance the EU internal dairy market and stabilise market returns.

Butter, cheese and milk powders will be eligible for export refunds from next week, under the arrangements outlined yesterday in Berlin by the commissioner.

Intervention buying of butter and skimmed milk powder will also be kept open longer than usual to absorb more product.

Export refunds for dairy products were discontinued in June 2007 when dairy commodity prices soared. They are being reintroduced not only for butter and skimmed milk powder but also for all other dairy products which were eligible in the past, mainly whole milk powder and cheese.

Refunds for butter and skimmed milk powder are fixed by tender with the next round of bids to be decided on next week.

The announcement may have little direct bearing on the UK dairy industry since very little milk goes into bulk commodities and exchange rates are providing some insulation for commodity market prices which have crashed in the last year.

However, the indirect effects of a weak commodity market cannot be ignored so UK industry leaders have welcomed the Commissioner's announcement as a prudent response.

SFP sales kick off successfully ABERDEEN & Northern Marts' first 2009 sale of single farm payment (SFP) entitlements, held yesterday, saw a strong start to the series.

A total of 454.38 units were sold with a top price of £1,020 per unit for 81.20 units valued at 456.07, a multiplier of 2.8.

Top multiplier was 3.0 for 25.03 units, valued at 329.46, attaining a price of £780.

The values were based on the agricultural payment conversion rate of 0.7903 to the pound.

John Gregor, Aberdeen & Northern Marts' general manager, commented: "Our national sales are regarded as the benchmark for SFP trading and no doubt the strength of the euro and clarification on future modulation rates have helped the sale.

"The level of interest shows there is clearly plenty of demand for future sales and we are looking forward to the next sale of entitlements which will take place on Friday, January 30."