Lakeland Dairies is the first processor to announce a July milk price, and has increased payments to all suppliers in both the Republic of Ireland (RoI) and Northern Ireland.

In the RoI, the milk price has increased by 2.25c/L to pay 57.35c/L inclusive of VAT, for milk at 3.6% fat and 3.3% protein.

On average, the Lakeland Dairies’ pay out in RoI will be 60.6c/L for July milk.

Boost for fixed-price suppliers
In RoI, all farmers involved in fixed milk-price contracts will receive an 8c/L supplementary payment.

In Northern Ireland, Lakeland Dairies has increased its milk price by 2.0p/L to 46p/L.

This will see Lakeland Dairies pay out, on average, 47.42p/L for June milk including adjustments for constituents and quality, and volume bonusses and zero cartage charges.

Boost for fixed-price suppliers
In Northern Ireland, all fixed milk-price contracts will receive a 7p/L supplementary payment.

The ongoing buoyancy in dairy markets is starting to level off with auction prices well down from recent highs and a cooling off in demand for higher priced product categories, the processor said.

“Global economic conditions including severe inflation, high input costs at farm and processing levels and rising interest rates, aligned with seasonality and weather events, will continue to affect the international balance of supply and demand,” a spokesperson said.

“Consumer sentiment is being affected by generally increasing costs across all kinds of goods and services including food and energy.”

Lakeland Dairies said it continues to monitor market developments.

Meanwhile, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) has released (Thursday, August 11) the Agricultural Price Indices for June 2022, which reveals that the price of milk has increased by almost 45% since June last year.

The data reveals that the agricultural input price index up by 40.2% in the year from June 2021, while agricultural output price index was up by 29.8% in the same period.