Dairy farmers plan large protest following cuts
Plans to demonstrate outside dairy processors and retailers following a meeting of 3,000 farmers in London has been backed by the NFU, it said today.
The 3,000 dairy farmers met in Central Hall Westminster yesterday in a rally call against cuts which may threaten the entire industry.
Deputy President Meurig Raymond and Agricultural Minister Jim Paice led the summit at a venue which was standing room only.
"The price cuts must be rescinded by August 1, and if this doesn’t happen, then we will support and facilitate targeted demonstrations outside processors and retailers" said Raymond.
"We will also mobilise the public with a concerted consumer campaign to help them understand the crisis facing the dairy industry and we will be asking them for their support with this campaign."
Announcements of further wholesale milk price cuts have met with anger from the region’s dairy producers.
Around 13.4 billion litres of milk are produced in the UK every year, delivered to dairies and manufacturers to produce our daily pinta, yoghurts, cheeses, cream and a variety of food ingredients.
Robert Wiseman Dairies, owned by Müller Dairies, Arla Foods UK, the UK subsidiary of Arla Foods Amba, as well as Dairy Crest, announced cuts to their milk prices paid to farmers as of August 1 of 1.7ppl, 2.0ppl and 1.65ppl respectively, following further significant cuts in recent months.
Robert Wiseman Dairies' blamed the move on a collapse in the value of cream over the past year.
Chairman of Dairy Crest Direct David Herdman said: “This latest 1.65ppl cut to our members, which comes on top of a 2.0ppl cut in May, will deliver a completely unsustainable milk price. In fact we estimate the deficit between milk price and production cost to be £53,000 a year for our liquid suppliers. It is for this reason that we are issuing a profit warning loss of £35million, for non-aligned DCD producers.”
Roddy Catto, Wiseman Milk Partnership acting chairman, said: “For the sake of our producers we have no option but to fight this cut – this scale of loss in untenable.”
Raymond continued by saying “all this co-ordinated action will be designed to put pressure and bring shame on the retailers and processors who have caused this crisis in the British dairy industry".
“We are still hopeful of agreement on a voluntary code of best practice in contracts, to bring some balance to the relationship between farmers and processors, but before long we have to ramp up our lobbying of Parliament to introduce statutory powers.”
