Kerry leads the way on July milk pricing as it lifted milk price by 0.94c/l excluding VAT this week.

Kerry was at the bottom in division three, beside near neighbours North Cork co-op Boherbue, when compared like for like in the June milk league.

This Kerry price increase will bring it up towards the top of the July league.

In a statement, Kerry said this increase is “in line with our Kerry Group milk contract commitment”. Kerry suppliers who have milk in fixed milk price contracts won’t get this price increase.

ICMSA dairy chair Gerald Quain accused Kerry Group of being “a little cute” suggesting that instead of increasing base price it has chosen to introduce a flat rate top-up of 1c/l on all milk except fixed price contracts.

Irish milk processors are this week setting July milk prices. So far, Glanbia, Lakeland and Dairygold Co-op all held milk price.

Lakeland has been leading the milk price base price comparison for a number of months at 34.1c/l or €4.78c/kg milk solids.

This week, the GDT auction was slightly positive (+0.3% average) as the auction result mirrored the steady market state.

For the last eight auctions the average result was slightly down but not by much. This week, all dairy commodities were slightly positive except whole milk powder that dropped 1.5% to $3,552/t in New Zealand. New Zealand milk supply is just starting on a lot of Kiwi farms now as cows calve down.