Meadow Foods ups June milk price and opens recruitment book
© Meadow Foods UK dairy processor Meadow Foods has increased its A litre milk price by 1p from 1 June, while also announcing it would recruit more producers.
The move means the milk buyer’s 650 producers will receive 27p/litre for milk with 4% butterfat and 3.3% protein.
See also: Dairy farmers capitalise on higher milk prices
For ease of comparison, the manufacturing litre of 4.2% butterfat and 3.4% protein will pay 27.38p/litre for Chester and 27.25p/litre for Cumbria.
Meadow Foods cited improved cream prices and reduced milk production in Europe due to recent bad weather as reasons behind the change.
The rise follows a price hold in May, which was preceded by 5p worth of cuts in 2018 alone.
“We are pleased to pass on the improvements in the market to our farmers just as soon as we can,” said Meadow Foods CEO Mark Chantler.
“We are now also looking to recruit a number of producers to meet the ever-increasing demand for Meadow’s products.”
“This is an exciting time for the business as we grow and extend our product range and reach, so I would encourage producers to take a fresh look at Meadow Foods to see what we have to offer you.”
Expert analysis
Peter Meehan at FC Stone said: “Europe’s EEX Dairy commodity futures remained firm this week as less-than-ideal grazing conditions throughout parts of western Europe continue to affect milk supply.
“European spot commodity prices moved higher again this week, with European butter prices climbing 17% over the past four weeks and SMP prices up more than 8% in the past three weeks.
“Supply-side concerns continue to provide support to the market, with the latest March milk collections numbers showing UK milk collections down 2.1% on last year [-0.4% in milk solid terms due to higher fat and protein content], New Zealand milk collections down 1.5%, while US collections increased by 1.3%.
“On the demand side, Chinese imports were somewhat subdued in March versus 2017, with WMP, SMP and cheese imports seeing multi-year lows for March.
“The latest European milk price numbers are showing the average monthly European price for February coming in at €34.39 [£30.05] per 100kg of standard milk at 4.2% fat and 3.4% protein. This is down €1.07 [94p] on January’s price, but up +2.4% or €0.82 [72p] on February 2017.
“The current butter and SMP futures prices suggest EU milk prices may be close to hitting their lowest ebb for 2018 and show signs of increases for the remainder of the year.”