The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) is urging other co-operatives to ‘follow’ the move by Lakeland Dairies to pay 32c/L including VAT for milk supplied in September.

The Cavan-based co-operative revealed its milk price following a meeting of its board earlier today (Tuesday, October 13).

It represents an increase of 1c/L in base price.

In Northern Ireland, a base price of 26.25p/L will be paid for September milk. Again, the base price has increased by 1p/L on the August price.

Milk market

Chairperson of the ICMSA Dairy Committee Ger Quain said the increase accorded with ICMSA’s view that markets had moved sufficiently forward to warrant all co-ops looking to increase their base prices by a similar margin.

Quain said: “Not for the first time, Lakeland was leading the way upwards on milk price and showing that it was possible to return competitive milk prices to its farmer-suppliers in line with the market data that all sector observers could see.”

Quain said that he hopes all other co-ops would now follow Lakeland’s decision and move their base price upwards in line with what were “indisputable market rises”.

Last week, it was revealed that Ornua’s Purchase Price Index (PPI) increased for the month of September.

In a brief statement to AgriLand on Wednesday, October 7, a spokesperson for Ornua said:

“The Ornua PPI for the month of September is 102.8 and is up from 101.8 in the previous month.”