Agriland spoke with the director of Dairy Industry Ireland (DII), Conor Mulvihill at the National Ploughing Championship, on the impact the EU-US trade deal will have on dairy and the slight downward pressures in dairy markets.

Mulvihill was full of enthusiasm about the really positive year 2025 was for dairy farmers, driven by good milk prices, weather and policy sentiment.

However, Mulvihill warned that there has been a "slight downward pressure" of already records prices in the last couple of months and is evident from the drop in milk prices from our co-ops for August supplies.

The director of DII warned that high prices will drive production globally and that better weather across the world is pumping extra supply on the market.

Mulvihill said: "We export 93% of our milk, so we are based on a global market, so there is a downward pressure there, but nothing fundamental that I can see."

Mulvihill reflected on the consensus that the EU-US trade deal is better than what we expected, but said that it is "not welcome at all" and added that "any trade dispute between the two is not welcome".

The only consolation was that the 15% was not put on existing tariffs, which leaves Ireland at a lower rate than the UK and New Zealand.

Mulvihill highlighted that there are a lot of goods going over to US, which buys nearly a billion euro worth of dairy and that Irish dairy going to the US has been "a real success story".

"What isn't said is that we are a huge success story for the US dairy" he noted, adding that Irish milk co-ops are also major customers of the US dairy industry.

In terms of how the trade deal is working out at the moment, Mulvihill said: "We did a lot of forward selling into the market and we are still working our way out."

He stressed that, at the moment, negotiations and trade are going well but the main problem is the collapse of the US dollar by 15%, which he said on top of a 15% tariff is really like a 30% tariff.

Mulvihill added that US does not produce enough casein and that Ireland sells a lot to them as a result.

Negotiations are ongoing with the US, European and Irish authorities to "see if we can get zero for zero, win-win tariff on that".

Mulvihill said that this move would be "a big help to Irish farmers and farm gate prices."

The director of DII also went on to talk about the positive results coming from three consecutive Environmental Protection Agency reports on nitrates levels in our water.

He also describes the positive work farmers are doing to improve water quality and retain the Nitrates Derogation for 2026.