Milk farmers will start 2016 'in a miserable state', European Milk Board says

European dairy farmers will be starting 2016 in a 'miserable state of affairs', according to the European Milk Board as they continue to call for EU Commissioner for Agriculture Phil Hogan to resign.

Milk prices have been rock-bottom for months, and despite ongoing protests by milk producers throughout Europe, there has been 'no change in the EU Commission’s short-sighted growth and export strategy', said board said.

"There are solutions, though: with its Market Responsibility Programme (MRP) the European Milk Board (EMB) has put forward an instrument for flexible crisis management that would stabilise the European milk market in the long term.

"However, EU Commissioner for Agriculture Phil Hogan is not prepared to engage with this concept or table his own proposals for tackling the causes of the massive price collapses. Given his head-in-the-sand attitude, is Hogan’s position as Commissioner for Agriculture still tenable?"

Numerous protests and demonstrations were held in member countries of the European Milk Board as farmers took to the streets in their tractors, protest letters were handed in, warning fires lit and balloons let off.

The milk market crisis is a burning issue and a stark threat to many farms in Europe.

"Some farms have already gone bankrupt. Others can only continue producing with the help of further loans of tens or hundreds thousands of euros. The reason for these dramatic developments is the imbalance between supply and demand on the dairy market," said Schaber.

"Nevertheless, at the last Agriculture Council, Commissioner Hogan spoke again about a stabilisation of the milk market. This was just yet another statement in a series of comments that make us doubt that Phil Hogan really wants to find a solution and whether he is capable of doing so."

The low milk prices of recent months are 'no short-term market fluctuations' that a healthy farm can absorb.

Farm-gate prices in most EU countries are now about 10 to 20 cents below production costs (in Ireland and Northern Germany 25 cents a litre, in Lithuania just 19 cents a litre).

In a TV interview in September, Hogan said it was not true that milk prices do not cover production costs.

"I don't think that many farmers are producing at below the cost of production. They say that they are, but at the end of the day they continue to produce."

The letter wrote that such declarations were 'not in line' with the reality of the market and showed Hogan's lack of expertise in the field.

"For several reasons, a great majority of dairy farmers are nonetheless virtually obliged to try their utmost to maintain production. Milk is simply not comparable to regular industrial products, whose production can just be halted one day and started again the following one," said Schaber.

"The current negative trend is dangerous for EU agriculture. What will therewith be destroyed cannot be recovered. Interactions between market players need to be characterised by fairness and responsibility as well as an open eye on real market developments. In order to assure this, the Commissioner for agriculture needs to have the right instinct and sensitivity, virtues that Mister Hogan lacks."

"Mr President, remove this incompetent Commissioner from his office!"

The Farmers’ Union of Wales has met with Conservative MEP Kay Swinburne to discuss the problems currently faced by dairy producers in a bid to send a strong message straight to Brussels.

The meeting was held at FUW member Brian K Jones’s farm at Cefncoed Farms, Coed y Parc, Caersws, Newtown, who runs a 210 acre dairy farm with his wife Susan and son Andrew.

The couple have recently had their milk supply contract cancelled and were keen to drive a strong message straight to Brussels about the dire situation many Welsh family run dairy farmers find themselves in.

Brian, who sits on the FUW milk and dairy produce committee as the Montgomeryshire delegate, said: “The current situation faced by many Welsh dairy farmers is unacceptable and further action needs to be taken to address the problems facing family farms which are under real threat.”

He also took the opportunity to highlight the difficulties facing farmers such as himself whose contracts had been cancelled by Meadow Foods.