Article by Martin Whiteside, International Development consultant,

Stroud District Councillor and the Green Party's Parliamentary

candidate for Stroud District. 

If Tesco was paying its workers £2.90 an hour it would be a national

scandal. The fact that Britain's dairy farmers earn on average £2.90 an

hour, and are paid less for their milk than they were 20 years ago

should warrant a similar response.

Farmers here in Gloucestershire and indeed in the rest of the country

and abroad are seeing the price paid to them fall, nowhere more so than

the dairy sector. In the front line are Britain’s dairy farmers,

currently being forced out of business at a rate of 40 farms a week,

including 3 or 4 that will be lost in Gloucestershire in the very near

future. That is why across the country, actions like the recent ones

outside Tesco in Stroud and Quedgeley, farmers and an increasing number

of consumers have been lobbying Tesco to pay a fairer price.

Mad as it sounds, today Britain’s dairy farmers get paid less money for

their milk than they did 20 years ago. Unfortunately, this hasn’t meant

a fall in price for British shoppers. In the last decade, the average

retail price for a litre of milk has gone up by seven pence to 48p

whilst the price the farmer gets has fallen six pence to just 18p.

Since 2000 some 6,300 dairy herds have disappeared and as the milk

crisis deepens, it’s being predicted that a further one in three dairy

farmers will soon go out of business. To stay afloat, the rest are

being forced to intensify by increasing herd sizes. The consequences

are that rural employment suffers - small farms provide up to five

times more jobs per acre than big farms, the environment suffers -

small farms are also known to provide diverse habitats for wildlife and

Britain’s high animal welfare standards are put at risk.

As local farmer, Julia Currie from Stroud explains “Animal health and

welfare standards are bound to be compromised when fewer people are

expected to look after many more animals.”

There are also potential consequences for the British consumer as local

cheese maker, Jessica Hodge, says “Where will our fresh milk come from

if we lose one in three of our dairy farmers? It’s not just fresh milk

either, we could lose English Butter, and all the regional cheeses like

Single and Double Gloucester and Wensleydale cheese.”

Yet the government is unwilling to intervene. Sir Brian Bender,

permanent secretary at DEFRA recently said “The Government has a view

that it wishes to have sustainability…but the number of farmers in a

particular sector is not an issue the Government has a view on." So if

not the Government, then who will save Britain’s dairy farmers?

Demanding Just Milk

The national campaign to put a stop to poverty milk prices has been

launched by FARM, the independent voice of farmers and supported

locally by the Gloucestershire Green Party. The Just Milk campaign asks

shoppers to join with farmers and write to Tesco, as the biggest of the

supermarkets and to use its market power to ensure that its dairy

farmers get a fair share of the retail price.

Stroud dairy farmer, Rye Godsell said: “We want to see a commitment

from Tesco that its criteria includes a fair return on the farmer’s

time and investment. A fair price for farmers would help to stop the

loss of so many dairy herds with all the negative implications that

would entail to the environment, wildlife and rural communities.”

Tesco is immensely profitable – it’s said to get one in eight pounds

spent by UK shoppers. With this power comes a responsibility to do

right by the food producers on whom its profits are based. Consumers

know that the retail price does not need to increase – there is already

profit in the milk chain – all we are asking is for a fair share of

those profits to go to the farmer.

I have worked for 20 years as a rural development adviser to charities

like Christian Aid and Oxfam and this often brings me face to face with

unfair trade in developing countries.  It is shocking to see some of

our biggest companies practicing equally unfair trade in our own

country. It has to stop. To help Britain’s dairy farmers and ensure

that the country has a sustainable dairy industry – with a secure

supply of milk and a high number and diversity of farms, supporting

rural communities and wildlife – please join the Just Milk campaign by

calling FARM on 0207 352 7928 or the Gloucestershire Green Party on

01453 751189.

Who’s milking it? The balance of power in dairying in the UK

The average family dairy farmer’s annual income is about £11,000 and

according to a Government report over the past 7 years the average

dairy farmer has earned just £2.90 an hour.

Tesco chief executive Sir Terry Leahy earns £2.6 million a year and

last year Tesco’s annual profits were equal to half the income

generated by the entire UK farming industry.

Notes to editors

In 2003, the retailers’ margin on liquid milk was 12.92 p/l [from MDC

Datum figures]. The reply from Tesco claims that ‘the dairy companies

sell us milk for about 3p less than the price we sell it at. Those few

pennies must stretch to cover all of our store and staff costs etc.

However, because most liquid milk is delivered straight to the store,

unlike other groceries, which are delivered to regional distribution

centres, costs are lower on liquid milk than on other groceries.

The Just Milk campaign demands that Tesco uses its market power to

ensure its dairy farmers get a fair share of the retail price and that

it publicly acknowledges that a sustainable dairy industry depends on a

high number and diversity of farmers. FARM launched the campaign on

23rd September 2004. So far, 10,000 requests for Just Milk campaign

action packs have been made by members of the public and the farming

community, with over 30,000 postcards distributed. 286 postcards are

known to have been sent to Tesco. 500 cards were distributed at Stroud

Tesco on 4th December.

“Over the past decade, farmgate prices and farm margins have fallen,

dairy processor margins have remained fairy constant, while retailer

margins have increased across all products. [MDCDatum Dairy supply

chain margins report 2003/04]

In 1998, there were 36,700 dairy producers in the UK; in 2003 there

were 26,000. That’s just over 10,000 lost over just five years, c.40 a

week [from www.mdcdatum.org.uk ]

To stay in business, dairy farmers are being forced to intensify by

increasing herd sizes. On 22nd Oct 2004, environment minister Elliot

Morley accused intensive dairy farming of having the ‘biodiversity

capacity of green concrete” Smaller family farms are known to provide

diversity in the countryside and valuable habitats for wildlife.

Intensification also leads to the loss of rural employment with real

implications for rural communities and the rural economy– smaller and

family farms provide up to five times more jobs per acre than big

farms. Intensification with few herdsmen caring for more cows will also

put Britain’s high animal welfare standards at risk.

The Government says it ‘has no view’ on the number of dairy farmers it

thinks the country needs. In a meeting of the Committee of Public

Accounts concerning ‘Helping farm businesses in England’ (13 October

2004), Sir Brian Bender, permanent secretary at DEFRA said the

following "...the Government has no view about the number of dairy

farmers, the number of beef farmers and so on. The Government has a

view that it wishes to have sustainability, a sustainable farming

industry, and it wishes to have vibrant rural communities, but the

number of farmers in a particular sector is not an issue the Government

has a view on."