New price blow for Shropshire dairy farmers
Farmers have received a fresh hammer blow after one of the country's leading dairy firms plunged its prices to a fresh low.
Hopes had been raised that the pressure on farmers was easing after Muller Wiseman announced last week that it was to hold its milk price for April on the back of improvements in global commodity prices.
Now, however, First Milk has announced a new payments system for suppliers, which will see it pay as little as 16p for some of its supply.
The company is introducing a new pricing structure which splits its milk into A and B categories.
It will pay 20.87ppl for the manufacturing pool and 20.5ppl for the balancing pool for its A supply, and 16ppl to 18ppl for the B supply, affecting around 20 per cent of its milk.
Jeremy Lowe, the Telford-based regional dairy spokesman for the NFU, said: "Members will be feeling frustration with First Milk with this announcement of shockingly low prices for both the 'A' and 'B' volumes.
"Put simply, this is a price cut masquerading as a new pricing model. We have seen positive signals recently and this needs to feedback onto farm urgently.
"The B price forecast of 16-18 p per litre is extremely cautious – sitting at around the EU powder intervention price this is not manageable for farmers to deal with."
First Milk chairman Sir Jim Paice added: "There remain a number of uncertainties. For example, although the recent figures have been encouraging, as yet, they have not fed through to milk prices and many buyers are awaiting the outcome of the forthcoming spring flush.
"As a board we will continue to monitor market indicators closely and build these into our decision-making on milk price."
