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SPILT MILK: COVID-19 AND DAIRY Covid-19 sent milk prices tumbling and caused public shock at wasted milk, but the crisis in dairy is much more long-term. By Megan Tatum @1988_megan
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wo weeks ago, Robert Mallett dumped 17,000 litres of fresh milk onto the ground of his 300-acre Wiltshire farm and watched it drain away. His buyer Freshways, one of the UK’s largest dairy processors, was one of many that had temporarily halted collections as the UK lockdown obliterated sales from the foodservice sector (which makes up 40 per cent of its business). It was a move that affected dairy farmers the length and breadth of the country. Only a few miles from Mallett, at JoJo’s Dairy, Josette Feddes had been forced to do the same, dumping the bulk of the 6,000 litres produced each day by her 250-strong herd. It was an “utterly desperate” act, she said. The sight of fresh milk going to waste only weeks after supermarket shelves had sat bare struck a chord. When Mallett uploaded a video of his milk gushing along the ground online it was shared 750 times, attracting 300 comments full of outrage and empathy. But devastatingly wasteful as it might be, “two days’ worth of dumping milk won’t bankrupt me,” he says. “A year of milk prices being way below the cost of production could.” Organic dairy has been even worse hit. Since the two biggest buyers of organic milk – Pret a Manger and McDonald’s – closed
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Thousands of litres of milk have been poured away since the eating-out sector has been shut down.
their doors, many organic milk suppliers have also been forced to pour milk away or else sell it on the spot market far below the cost of production. In a sense, the pandemic has only exposed the deep cracks and shallow margins that have plagued British dairy for decades. According to Defra figures, the average price paid for liquid milk to farmers in 2015 was 24p per litre – the same price paid in 1995. That’s despite 20 years of inflation pushing up the costs of many goods and services by about 70 per cent in the same time period. On the one hand, the value placed on milk has suffered as a result of a fierce price war between UK supermarkets. In 2015, the average price of a four-pint carton famously dipped below bottled water, selling for just 89p in some cases. At the same time the supply chain has consolidated. Around 90 per cent of fresh milk is now processed and sold by just seven companies, according to Defra. That places significant power in fewer hands. The knock-on effect has been huge volatility in the prices paid to British dairy farmers. It’s thought about half have given up their business in the last 20 years as a result. Many have protested at the supermarkets they blame for driving down value: one memorable
