The Minister for Climate, Environment and Communications has heard directly from Lakeland Dairies about the concerns farmers have in relation to national climate targets.
During a meeting between Minister Eamon Ryan and a delegation from Lakeland Dairies led by its chair, Niall Matthews and group chief executive, Colin Kelly the minister heard in particular how dairy farmers are worried about the potential loss of the nitrates derogation.
Niall Matthews said the co-op’s representatives highlighted to Minister Ryan about the steps the co-op and its members are “taking to protect and enhance water quality across our catchment area”.
Lakeland Dairies
According to Matthews, Lakeland Dairies has provided “considerable resources” to the Agricultural Sustainability Support and Advisory Programme (ASSAP) and other other climate and water quality initiatives, chiefly through its farm sustainability programme, Farming for a Better Future.
He said they also “clearly laid out the concerns our farmers have regarding national climate targets” to the minister.
“Our farmers are rightly concerned regarding recent policy changes and the direction of travel we are going in regarding the dairy industry.
“There is a huge amount of unease and worry among our suppliers and we wanted to ensure the minister was acutely aware of these concerns,” Matthews added.
He said one of the key messages that the co-op was keen to stress to Minister Ryan was “the absolute necessity of maintaining the nitrates derogation”.
“Irish dairying is a hugely sustainable sector, and it is also an economic powerhouse that is the lifeblood of thousands of rural communities across the country.
“The derogation is a key component of the industry and its loss would be unimaginable, especially in light of the huge work being carried out at farm and processor level to enhance water quality,” Matthews said.
The chair of the cross-border co-op, which has 3,200 farm family suppliers, said it also highlighted to Minister Ryan the “huge efforts” being made by Lakeland Dairies farmers to build on the strong sustainability work they have carried out so far.
According to the co-op more than 90% of its suppliers have signed up for Lakeland Dairies’ Sustainability Incentive Payment, ‘Farming for a Better Future’ – which requires them to carry out sustainability actions in return for a new payment.
Farmers who signed up to the initiative started receiving a 0.5c/L or 0.5p/L payment from January according to the processor.