Glanbia Co-operative Society is to make up to €20 million available in an extended credit scheme to assist milk suppliers overcome the severe drought now affecting the entire Glanbia region.

The Glanbia Co-op Extended Credit Scheme will support qualifying members by offering interest-free deferred payment terms for the purchase of dairy feed and fertiliser from Glanbia Ireland over the next nine weeks.

Glanbia chairman Martin Keane said that soil moisture deficits are now over 90mm in the majority of the Glanbia catchment area, with feed demand currently running at four to five times the rate of grass growth.

“This is placing a severe strain on our dairy farmers, who are forced to spend heavily on supplementary inputs for their herds,” he said.

The full details and an application form for the Glanbia Co-op Extended Credit (EC) Scheme will be communicated to all eligible Glanbia Co-op members in the coming days.

Keane continued: “Supporting our members is a key element of our co-op’s strategy.

“We believe that making interest-free extended credit available to milk supplier members for qualifying feed and fertiliser purchases for the next two months is appropriate given the scale of the current challenges.”

The chairman said that the inclusion of fertiliser in the scheme would ensure that Glanbia Co-op members could take full advantage when grass growth resumes, in order to replenish seriously depleted winter fodder reserves to the maximum extent possible.

Glanbia Advance Payment (GAP) Scheme

Meanwhile, Keane reminded Glanbia co-op milk supplier members that interest-free support funds are also available from the Glanbia Advance Payment (GAP) 2018 Milk Scheme, which provides interest-free cash flow support with drawdown and repayment linked to movements in milk price.

This means that a GAP advance of 1c/L is available to co-op members on April and May 2018 milk supply volumes.