The Member States involved in the distribution plan for the 2010 budget year have supplied the Commission with the information required in accordance with Article 1 of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92.

For the purposes of resource allocation, account must be taken of experience and of the degree to which the Member States used the resources allocated to them in previous years.

Point 1(c) of Article 2(3) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 provides for the allocation of resources for the purchase on the market of products temporarily unavailable in intervention stocks. Given that the stocks of cereals currently held by the intervention agencies are not sufficient to cover the allocations corresponding to the requests for cereals and rice, resource allocations should be fixed to enable the purchase on the market of cereals or rice as required to implement the distribution plan for the 2010 budget year.

Article 7(1) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 provides for the transfer between Member States of products unavailable in the intervention stocks of the Member State in which such products are required to implement the annual distribution plan. Accordingly, the intra-Community transfers necessary to implement that plan for 2010 should be authorised, subject to the conditions laid down in Article 7 of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92.

Article 7(3) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 provides the option, in cases where transfer of products from the Member State in which they are held in intervention to another Member State is foreseen, for operators to submit a bid without transferring the products released from intervention stocks to the applicant Member State. Article 25 of Regulation (EC) No 1234/2007 provides that disposal of products bought into public intervention should take place in such a way as to avoid disturbances in the market.

Due to the current market situation in the dairy sector, which is marked by low price levels, the use of the option provided in Article 7(3) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 should not be allowed in the 2010 distribution plan for butter and skimmed milk powder in order to avoid possible disturbances in the market following the release of those products in certain markets that are already well supplied. For the same reason, the use of the possibilities offered to operators in paragraphs 2 and 2a of Article 4 of that Regulation should be limited so that dairy products intended for distribution to the most deprived persons in the Community comply with certain requirements concerning their composition and quantity of milk used in their manufacturing. In order to monitor the compliance with that rule, the Member States should provide in their progress reports a detailed list of distributed products placed under the categories ‘high fat content’ or ‘other’.

In order to ensure that the dairy products from the intervention stocks do not enter the market at an inappropriate moment during the year, the time period provided in the third subparagraph of Article 3(2) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 during which butter and skimmed milk powder may be withdrawn from the intervention stocks should be shortened.

Taking into account the complexity of the implementation of the 2010 distribution plan requiring a high volume of intra-Community transfers, it is appropriate to increase the 5 % margin provided in Article 3(3) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92.

To implement the annual distribution plan, the operative event within the meaning of Article 3 of Regulation (EC) No 2799/98 should be the date on which the financial year for administration of stocks in public storage starts.

In accordance with Article 2(2) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92, the Commission has consulted the major organisations familiar with the problems of the most deprived persons in the Community when drawing up the annual distribution plan.

Article 2(1) of Regulation (EEC) No 3149/92 provides that the Commission adopts the annual distribution plan before 1 October of each year. Due to the current market situation in the dairy sector and taking into account the need for further consultations with the Member States on their requests, it still has not been possible for the Commission to adopt the distribution plan. Therefore, in order to ensure timely execution of the annual distribution plan this Regulation should enter into force immediately after its publication.

The Management Committee for the Common Organisation of Agricultural Markets has not delivered an opinion within the time limit set by its Chair,