Asda’s milk price guarantee welcomed by Ulster Farmers’ Union
After protests and negotiations, UK retailers have struck a deal with farmers in the North to pay a minimum price per litre of milk.
Print17 August 2015
The move by UK retailer Asda to guarantee a minimum price of 28p per litre of milk has been welcomed by the Ulster Farmers’ Union, which described the move as a “significant development”.
The grocer will pay dairy farmers the agreed minimum price after talks with the National Farmers’ Union in Britain. These talks took place after protests by farmers who have seen their margins hit hard recently following a global dip in dairy prices, the Irish Times reports.
“This is a step in the right direction to ensure that consumes continue to have access to high qualiy locally produced food,” said UFU president Ian Marshall, “and it also recognises that farmers need a fair price to produce what consumers and retailers want.
“The challenge now is to extend this to other retailers and to products other than liquid milk,” Marshall continued, “but it would be churlish on our part not to recognise that Asda has set a trend; we would like to see other retailers and other areas of the food sector follow suit.”
Under the changes, Asda, Morrison and Aldi in the UK have committed to pay over the current average price per litre of milk paid to dairy farmers, 23.6p. The Times reports that Lidl has so far failed to follow suit.
Meanwhile, the average price paid to farmers for a litre of milk in Ireland is 34c (24p), only fractionally higher than the average UK price.
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