Dairy giant Muller has announced an increase of 1 pence per litre to its farm gate milk price with effect from 1st October 2017, taking its standard litre price over 30ppl.
The last time Muller paid that much to farmers was in September 2014 – shortly before the market began a deep dive which saw prices tumble to less than 20p per litre.
The company unveiled a series of measures to help suppliers "build a vibrant dairy businesses for the future".
Müller has confirmed a £100m of investment in its UK network of dairies so that it can build an additional £700m worth of sales of dairy products made with milk from British farmers, by 2020.
The business said it wants to "increase confidence and resilience" amongst its dairy farmer suppliers against a "backdrop of volatile and unpredictable global dairy markets", and uncertainty surrounding future support for farmers following the UK’s departure from the EU.
'Healthy interest'
In late July, Müller also confirmed the introduction of a new Müller Direct Futures Contract option, giving dairy farmers the opportunity to agree a monthly price for up to 25% of their milk volume, for 12 months ahead.
Muller said this option has received an 'healthy interest' from suppliers.
It also announced the introduction of Müller Farm Insight, a new service for dairy farmers offering valuable data, welfare tools and benchmarking, to help their businesses.
And the company launched Müller Direct, which comprises the 700 of the company’s 1,800 farmer suppliers who aren’t currently part of groups aligned to major supermarket customers. Müller Direct farmers are the focus for all of the above initiatives.
Müller Agriculture Director Rob Hutchison said there is "a lot of uncertainty out there" but the company remains optimistic.
He said: “Britain remains one of the best places in the world to produce milk and Müller is investing heavily to ensure that consumers will be able to buy more and more dairy products made in Britain with milk from British farmers.
“We want to work with farmers to realise our shared ambitions as the basis of a progressive industry with the security and confidence to invest.”
