A recent survey of major milk buyers suggests there are currently around 8,850 dairy producers in Britain.
The AHDB estimate represents the number of dairy producers actively contributing to British milk production.
It is based on the number of active producers and temporary inactive producers from the milk buyers that contribute to the Daily Milk Deliveries survey.
This covers approximately 75% of volumes in Britain, and so the estimate has been adjusted accordingly. A figure based on Levy data has been used to account for direct suppliers.
However, the true number has been shrouded in uncertainty recently. The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has been the most used source to track producer numbers across England and Wales.
But this database is going through a cleansing process, resulting in the numbers falling dramatically over the last few months.
Defra’s dairy holdings number includes all farms with a dairy cow over 2 years old with offspring.
The latest data, for 2017, showed that Britain had 16,605 dairy holdings. However nearly 40% of these had fewer than 10 cows, making them more likely to be suckler herds than dairy farms.
Despite the ongoing decline in dairy producers, milk production is expected to be the highest in 29 years.
Other factors, including cow numbers and yields, have a larger bearing on production than the number of producers.
