No one owns sugar quota

HOPES of establishing who owns the sugar production quotas which the EU wants to scrap have been dashed by the European Commission’s statement that the quota is not an asset. It is not owned by anybody, but is simply a mechanism for regulating the market, according to the Commission.

This has been confirmed by legal advice given to the Irish government by the Attorney General.

The EU proposes to offer between €370 and €730 per tonne of sugar quota renounced, where processors cease production. According to a Department of Agriculture source, Irish Sugar would have to renounce sugar quota in respect of Carlow, in order to get a Brussels payout for the closure of the Carlow factory last spring.

“This is something we would have to consider. We would not want to renounce the quota”, said the Department’s assistant secretary general, Michael Heraghty, in an Oireacthas Joint Committee on Agriculture and Food debate.