Italian dairies are being blamed for importing milk illegally and registering the shipments as produced in Italy. This practice, according to farmers’ organisations, is the sole reason why Italy appears to produce over the milk quota limit every year.
Farmers’ organisations are appealing to Brussels about the over-production super-levy for last year, claiming that Italy was in fact 100,000 tonnes under quota and that all the extra milk came from Germany and France. The Italian super-levy being claimed by Brussels for 1996/97 year amounts to the equivalent of