Dairy Farmers Fighting Back Over Milk Prices

Dairy farmers are bracing themselves for further lowering of the wholesale price of milk - and they've promised more direct action as the industry slides into crisis.

Some milk producers have already protested by forming rolling roadblocks; others have taken part in "trolley dashes" in supermarkets, buying all the milk on the shelves, then either giving it away or selling it for a nominal fee and donating the money to charity.

Michael Oakes has a 180-strong dairy herd near Birmingham. He's also the vice-chair of the NFU's dairy board.

He's been farming for more than 30 years, but says the current plight of the dairy industry is the worst he's ever known.

"Every day we are losing money," he says during a break in his early morning milking schedule.

"I'll be worse off tomorrow, and next week, and next month. For a few years now I've tried to stay optimistic, and tried to see a chink of light at the end of the tunnel, but it's fading away as things just get progressively worse."

Mr Oakes sells his milk for 24p a litre to Arla, which is a good price in the current climate. Some of his neighbours are only getting 18p.

But the break-even point for most dairy units is 28-30p per litre.

Arla is a global dairy company and co-operative owned by 13,500 dairy farmers, around 3,000 of whom are British.

From today, they've reduced the price they'll pay for a standard litre to 23.01p.

Commenting on the reduction, Ash Amirahmadi, head of UK milk and member services, said: "The downward price trend is continuing across markets globally, and this has put further considerable pressure on the markets.

"The situation is not helped by high milk production throughout the world, while demand from China and Russia, in particular, continues to be low. These global developments are impacting all dairy markets throughout the world."

The farmers say direct action and smart use of social media are the best ways to try and inform the British public about the situation they face.

But they acknowledge it's difficult thing to keep consumers on their side.

"We want to carry on with direct action, but don't want to lose public support for Britain's farmers," says Mr Oakes.

"We know that the public are backing us, but what we need is for a supermarket or other big retailer to take the lead and start charging a fair price. Then, if just 25% of the consumers who say they'll support us start paying the higher price, we could get out of this downward spiral."

Until that happens though, the short term future for milk prices, and for the dairy farmers, looks bleak.