Milk Production

Earl of Shrewsbury Excerpts

Thursday 15th January 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley]

I certainly agree with the first half of what the noble Lord has said. I am not suggesting that the work on labelling is by any means the only tool. That is why, as I have said, we are looking at the use of futures markets, because there is evidence of a seasonal cyclicality of milk prices. At certain times of the year a crunch tends to be worse, and such crunches can be foreseen, so we want to smooth that curve. But crucial is our work on exports, and noble Lords will be interested to know that exports to non-EU markets of dairy products are up by 47% year on year.

[The Earl of Shrewsbury (Con)]

My Lords, is it not the case that one of the ways forward could be the model used by Tesco which has a margin-plus deal with farmers where at least farmers have an idea of what the future looks like and they get a decent price for their milk?

[Lord De Mauley]

Yes, my Lords. Certainly, innovative deals such as that are of real value to farmers. Sadly, not all farmers are able to negotiate those deals, but we are working with them, as I have said, on various ways to resolve the problem.