This new programme is looking at dairy farming issues in Northern Ireland and the Republic. With quota barriers to be dismantled across the EU at the end of March 2015, it is very timely to look at how dairy farmers north and south of the border have evolved and will develop in the next number of years.

In the North over the last 10 years, dairy farmers have developed scale and expanded facilities. While some growth in scale has been possible for southern producers, more of the focus has been on cost reduction and improving technology.

All of this means there are lessons for farmers north and south to learn from each other. The focus of the programme is on optimising the use of farm resources for profitable milk production in an environment without EU quotas.

It is not focusing specifically on expansion or on farm system comparisons. Instead, it will draw on farmer experience and highlight the use of benchmarking and measurement of performance to guide decision-making in farm management.

This initiative would not be possible without the involvement of the following key stakeholders: Lakeland Dairies, Devenish Nutrition, Irish Farmers Journal, CAFRE - Northern Ireland’s College of Agriculture Food and Rural Enterprise, Teagasc (Advice, Education and Research in the South), and AFBI Hillsborough.

Finding answers to key questions

Milk prices have come a long way from the highs of last year and are still on the way down. Right now, the squeeze is on winter milk producers, but no one is predicting any improvement before the middle of 2015.

What are you doing about it? What can you do, inside your farm business, to help you through the downs and to maximise profit in the better times that we believe will come around again? How can you make best use of the resources that you have available to put your dairy enterprise on the best possible path to profit?

These are key questions for dairy farmers throughout Ireland. Dairylink Ireland is a new programme seeking answers to these questions at farm level, just as they are faced by dairy farmers from day-to-day. It is modelled along the lines of the Teagasc/Irish Farmers Journal BETTER farm programme and will focus on farms in the Lakeland Dairies milk collection area, north and south of the border. Features from the programme will be reported each week in the Irish Farmers Journal to make information and advice widely available.

Ireland produces milk for the world. The vast majority of milk produced on the island is going into products for export and the industry is viewed as a mainstay of the economy, with expansion of dairy output a key objective.

An expanding population signals big opportunities for increased sales, but the world market for dairy products has a long history of price volatility as supply and demand swing in and out of balance. This is the market in which milk producers have to operate in the years ahead. How are you going to compete in this global market?

Huge commitment to dairy expansion

Speaking about the Dairylink programme, Lakeland Dairies chief executive Michael Hanley highlighted the commitment of over €30m being made by the co-op to the expansion of its milk processing facilities.

He said: “This is funded from within the operation and without any additional capital levies or share-up contributions from milk suppliers.”

Hanley went on to say that it is a global market and customers in 70 countries are seeking an increased supply of the products marketed by Lakeland Dairies.

Emphasising the strength of a spread of outlets, he said that China is just one of those countries to be serviced from the co-op’s new state-of-the-art global distribution centre at its factory in Newtownards.

Hanley is extremely positive about the future for the dairy industry and welcomed the Dairylink initiative to help dairy farmers make best use of their resources.

John Gilliland, director of agriculture at Devenish Nutrition, said that the link to the rest of the world is key to the expansion of the dairy industry, as it has been for Devenish, now selling product in 40 countries.

Expressing support for the new programme and the need for a focus on sustainability, Gilliland said that research and the use of science are fundamental to the business of Devenish Nutrition, which employs more than 30 post-doctoral staff.

The director of CAFRE, John Fay, highlighted the interest that had been generated through the NI Suckler Beef Programme, run by the Irish Farmers Journal in conjunction with CAFRE and ABP, and expressed confidence that Dairylink Ireland will similarly make its mark with the people involved in day-to-day production on farms.

He welcomed the involvement of the wide range of stakeholders from both sides of the border and the backing of permanent secretary Noel Lavery, Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) in NI.

Tom Kelly, director of knowledge transfer at Teagasc, referred to the development of the BETTER farm programme over the years and the good experience gained by stakeholders working together.

He expressed the support of Teagasc for the initiative being taken with Dairylink Ireland. Teagasc dairy adviser David Colbourne, from Cavan, is on the Dairylink management group.

AFBI deputy chief executive, Sinclair Mayne, commended the initiative and referred to the great asset which Ireland has in its ability to grow grass. He said that making optimum use of that most cost-effective input in varying conditions and with optimum use of concentrate feeding is one of the challenges for farmers and researchers.

He welcomed the opportunity for researchers to interact with farmers and said he looked forward to questions that would be raised by farmers.

Irish Farmers Journal editor and chief executive, Justin McCarthy, expressed delight at the combination of stakeholders brought together in Dairylink Ireland and said that it was fully in line with the aims of the Agricultural Trust, publishers of the Irish Farmers Journal.

He hoped that all would gain from the initiative, particularly the dairy farmers participating and the wider audience of farmers who would read about the experiences reported.