The Irish Farmers Journal understands that the board of Lakeland Dairies has rowed back on plans to limit supply and impose milk price penalties that were set to start in January 2023.

Correspondence to Lakeland suppliers this week suggests that the board has decided to withdraw the milk supply management scheme indefinitely.

Also, this week at the final board meeting for outgoing CEO Michael Hanley, it was decided to pay out a 13th payment on all 2022 milk supply to the tune of 0.6c/l. This will mean a €3,000 unexpected windfall for the average supplier delivering 500,000l.

The reason given by the spokesperson for the milk price top-up was that “it follows from a current year budgetary provision that was made to cater for extreme energy costs in 2022, and where fortunately that worst case scenario has been avoided.”