HC Deb 14 July 1995 vol 263 cc859-60W
Mr. Byers

To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what is the current tonnage and value of tobacco held in intervention by the European Commission. [34640]

Mr. Baldry

From the 1993 harvest, the facility to take tobacco into intervention was removed and it can be re-introduced only in exceptional circumstances. Details of the remaining- volume of intervention stocks for tobacco for harvests prior to 1993, updated on a monthly basis, are available in the Library of the House. There is no information readily available on the value of those stocks, although the value of the different consignments at the time of being taken into intervention, was taken into account in reimbursing member states for storage costs and stock depreciation.