Milk price warning due to record production (From Western Telegraph)

Milk price warning due to record production

The county's spring milk producing dairy farmers have been issued a price warning by their biggest buyer.

Record UK milk production this spring had highlighted the urgency for an industry-wide approach to tackling the problems caused by seasonal supply patterns, insisted First Milk. The farmer-owned co-operative, which buys the bulk of the milk produced in Pembrokeshire said incentives were in place to encourage farmers to produce more milk in the autumn.

Its dual pricing system, adopted by 1,400 First Milk members, reflected the higher cost of producing milk in the autumn.

Pembrokeshire's ideal grass-growing climate had encouraged farmers to switch to spring calving to capitalise on the lower cost of producing milk from grass. They had been spurred on by low milk prices - a fact acknowledged by First Milk's Producer Services Director, Alan Taylor.

Figures released by the Rural Payments Agency indicated that milk production in April, May and June was 3903 litres - 60 million litres more than in the same period last year. Alan Taylor said manufacturing processors were being starved of milk in the second half of the year.

The co-operative's dual pricing system offered farmers the opportunity to switch production systems, he added.

"The system reflects the variation in market values between milk produced at different times of the year and between core and marginal production volumes.''

And he added: "As a result a member who increases production to the second half of the milk year will benefit from a marginal price which is more than double the marginal price during May and June.''

The system had been "well accepted and understood'' by First Milk members, he believed.