With some milk processors paying more for milk in January 2026 than they did in December 2025, there are a number of positional changes in our analysis of prices paid to 1m litre suppliers.

However, as shown in Table B, there is no movement at the top, with Tirlán/Fivemiletown nearly 3p/l ahead of its nearest competitor in the price paid for high, average and low solids milk.

Those milk qualities move in line with actual results reported to us by processors each month, so are down slightly from the December league.

Behind Tirlán, Leprino Foods is in second across all three milk qualities, having finished fourth for high solids last month and fifth for average and low solids milk. When compared to our 750,000l league, the Magheralin processor has also managed to leapfrog both Dale Farm and Strathroy mainly thanks to a 0.65p/l volume bonus for 1m litre suppliers.

Having kept its starting point unchanged from December, Dale Farm has slipped from second to third across all three milk qualities, while Aurivo has dropped from third to last after keeping its base unchanged and dropping its winter bonus from 3p to 2p/l.

Lakeland Dairies is off the bottom of the table and up to fifth across all three milk qualities having confirmed a 1.75p/l “input support” payment for January milk.

That has helped close the gap between second and fifth positions

Rolling average

Shown in Table C is the rolling average price paid over the last 12 months to 1m-litre suppliers across, high, average and low solids milk.

For average solids milk, Tirlán has extended its lead over Dale Farm from 0.36p to 0.58p/l.

The only positional change compared to our December league sees Leprino Foods move ahead of Lakeland and into fourth.

The 12-month averages are all down by around 1p/l, which highlights the fact that the prices paid in January 2025 were around 12p/l more than in January 2026.