ICMSA: Latest figures show need to fix farm income 'roller-coaster'
The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers' Association (ICMSA) has said that the latest figures from Teagasc show there is need to address the "roller-coaster" of farm incomes.
The average dairy farm income in 2026 could fall to around €80,000 - down from an estimated €137,000 this year, according to Teagasc economists.
The potential drop would represent a 42% decrease on the estimated average dairy income level for 2025.
The figures were included in the Teagasc Outlook 2026: Economic Prospects for Agriculture report, which sets out the prospects for Irish farmers for next year. The report was published this week.
According to the ICMSA, the projections on incomes and costs have demonstrated conclusively the "practical impossibility" of trying to build a predictable and family budget-friendly income from dairy or beef farming.
Denis Drennan, the ICMSA president, said that any examination of the incomes to be earned by producing milk or beef over the last decade will show "roller-coaster" peaks and troughs that leave family farms unable to plan with certainty.
He said this problem is cited by the next generation of potential farmers as their biggest obstacle to considering farming as an occupation.
"Our members saw higher prices for beef and milk in 2025 – with milk prices falling like a stone for the last three months from September to the costs of production," Drennan said.
That ‘low' is predicted to continue into 2026 and the real danger is that it continues up to ‘peak’ production in May.
"If that disaster looks even possible then the case for a Voluntary Reduction Scheme at EU level becomes paramount and that ‘floor’ together with what we think will continue to be positive momentum in the beef market will help to keep milk producers afloat in the Spring," he added.
However, the ICMSA president said the the current model of incomes delivered by dairy and beef systems have "structural defects", and that this must be kept sight of.
"There simply has to be a better way to ensure stability and the long-term viability of the industry that avoids, or at least mitigates, the ‘boom and bust’ cycle of the markets.
"Since 2022, we have seen increases in the incomes of dairy family farms of 53% in 2022, 114% in 2024 and 26% in 2025, as calculated by Teagasc. But then there have been decreases – a better word would be ‘collapses’ - of 68% in 2023 and an expected fall of 42% in 2026," Drennan highlighted.
"How is it remotely possible to plan and invest in a farm given this level of volatility? What young person is going to go into an occupation with that level of unpredictability and erratic income?" he added.
Drennan again reiterated ICMSA calls for a 'Farm Deposit Scheme', which he said would be a "huge step forward to curbing the worst 'highs' and 'lows' of these boom-and-bust cycles".
"It is on all of us in the industry to ‘flatten these curves’ and to build a less erratic and more sustainable model of income from farming," he said.
