ICMSA expects milk price rise on back of Asian demand
Citing demand from Asia for milk powders, the Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) has said today (Wednesday, February 3) that it is expects milk prices from processors to rise this month.
Speaking in advance of the announcement of the first round of 2021 milk prices by co-ops, the chairperson of the ICMSA’s Dairy Committee noted the current “impressive momentum” behind the milk markets.
Ger Quain argued that co-ops must return higher prices to the farmer suppliers in the coming months, starting with the upcoming January price setting.
The milk ‘spot’ market has seen very strong momentum in the first four weeks of 2021 and that’s backed up by positive farmgate increases from the southern hemisphere, where Fonterra have upped their predicted price range for the season.
The president of Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) has described the level of monitoring that will be employed this year for the Protein Aid Scheme and other schemes in future years as “grossly intrusive and disquieting”.
Pat McCormack was referring to the new Checks by Monitoring (CbM) system that will be replacing the current ‘on-the-spot’ controls and will be compulsory in the new Common Agricultural Policy by January 1, 2024.
Controls for this year’s Protein Aid Scheme will, for the first time, be undertaken remotely through the use of the Area Monitoring System (AMS).
CbM is an automated and continuous process which will use satellite data along with other data sources to determine the agricultural activity on all land parcels declared by farmers under the Protein Aid Scheme in 2021.
It is this conclusion that will most astonish farmers, according to ICMSA president Pat McCormack.
“Mr. Dombrovskis must be aware of the fact that the number of family farms in the EU has declined – and is still declining – year on year,” McCormack said.
If what he said was true; if EU trade policy was benefitting agricultural producers, then that would be reflected in the numbers of EU citizens farming or otherwise engaged in primary food production, but those people are still leaving the sector every year.
“They’re showing what they think of the EU’s attitude to EU farming by leaving the sector. That’s the reality and every scrap of data for 25 years shows that that’s the case,” he added.