Zero Graze Milk

Indoor systems are more common in the UK and mainland Europe. There are probably a few herds in Ireland that are indoor but the majority of Irish dairy cows enjoy the freedom to graze in the fields weather permitting. Dairy farmers at present are struggling with all the wet weather that we are having so you may not see as many cows out as normal for this time of year. Fingers crossed the weather changes for the better soon as all livestock farmers are finding the conditions difficult.

Ultimately it is cheaper and better for the cows to walk to Grass themselves than pay thru the nose to bring it in.

I know 2 farmers that have the cows in all year round.

Co op won't take their milk as it doesn't fit with origin green

The co-op want to know how many acres have you around the parlour. If you have 50 acres and 300 cows it doesn’t take a genius to work it out.

Also plenty of gossiping goes on in rural Ireland. If you’re 100% zero grazing there will be plenty of people talking about you as it’s not the norm.

There is an exodus from liquid milk production because the cost of producing it is in no way reflected by the price obtained from the supermarkets.

The fact that all farmer suppliers to multiples are finding it impossible to continue is a damming reflection on supermarket pressures.

We are very close now to seeing imported milk on our shelves at some point in the year. It is likely that there will be a reset in this industry and we will end up with a very small group of large very specialised liquid milk producers paid properly through schemes like in the UK, however this type of production will tend further away from the grazed grass system that we typically have here.

Some smaller new contracts ....but poor for the farmers ...its just a way of accessing their milk pool for the couple of peak demand months. Mostly bigger lads getting out to hell and changing systems. There was a large oversupply of liquid volumes for the last decade or more.( especially in glanbia) bur there's a general tightening of suppliers and supplies as of the last couple of years.