Cathedral City maker Dairy Crest has announced it will reduce the milk price it pays to its milk suppliers by 0.5p/L from February 1, 2019.
In September 2018, the company introduced a supplementary payment of 0.5p/L to reflect feed shortages caused by extreme weather conditions.
Since then, the situation has improved. This additional payment will, therefore, be withdrawn from February 1, 2019, bringing the overall price paid to farmers to 29.9p/L. These changes have been agreed with Dairy Crest Direct (DCD).
“We have provided our farmers with both visibility and certainty over the past six months by maintaining a steady milk price and introducing a milk price floor until the end of January,” said Chris Thomson, group procurement director at Dairy Crest.
While this move will be disappointing for our farmers, we always aim to pay a fair, competitive price for our milk and, even with this reduction, our price remains higher than many other dairy companies.”
DCD chairman Steve Bone added: “We have been keeping a close eye on market developments and, therefore, this reduction in price is not unexpected.”
Dairy Crest
Dairy Crest is one of the leading British-owned dairy companies. The firm’s main consumer brands are Cathedral City, Clover, Country Life and Frylight.
The company, which is supplied by around 330 South West farmers also manufactures demineralised whey powder and galacto-oligosaccharides (GOS), a lactose-based prebiotic, both widely used in infant formula.
