Having been more than 5p behind Tirlán in our February league and 2p behind in March, Dale Farm has cut the gap to under 1p/l in our April analysis.

Tirlán/Fivemiletown has now led our monthly milk league for six months in a row and during that difficult period for dairy commodities it is the one processor that has minimised any fluctuations to its base price. The only change came in March, when the co-op added 1p to the base, taking it to 30.9p/l. It has also committed to holding at that price for May supplies.

Once adjustments are made for volume and milk quality, our calculations show Tirlán paid a final April price of 33.81p/l to a typical 750,000l supplier in NI.

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That price is down marginally on that from March due to changes in milk quality month-on-month.

To calculate prices, we use the actual milk quality recorded by DAERA for the same month in 2025, when butterfat averaged 4.21%, with protein at 3.33%, TBC of 21 and SCC at 178. While protein is the same as in March, butterfat is down 0.07 percentage points. SCC is also unchanged, although TBC is up, which does impact bonus payments made by a couple of processors.

Second place

Behind Tirlán, second placed Dale Farm paid a final price of 32.94p/l, which is up 0.92p on its March price.

NI’s largest farmer co-op did add 1p to base and also included an additional 1p/l “market support payment”, taking its starting point to 31.3p/l. However, the 1p/l 13th payment from Dale Farm, paid on all litres over the last milk year, was included in our March calculation, so effectively the co-op’s starting point in April was up 1p, not 2p/l.

Dale Farm also altered its butterfat and protein increments from 1 April 2026, with each 0.01% change in butterfat increasing from 0.034p to 0.037p/l and each 0.01% change in protein from 0.055p/l to 0.061p/l. At the milk qualities for April, this adds 0.14p/l to the Dale Farm price.

Behind Dale Farm, Aurivo held onto third position, with the co-op increasing its base price by 0.75p/l to 30.5p/l. That Aurivo price includes 1p/l of support from its milk price stability fund.

Leprino Foods has moved ahead of Lakeland into fourth after the Magheralin based company increased its base price by 1p/l, taking it to 28.75p/l. At April milk qualities, Leprino’s 0.75p/l mozzarella bonus also applies.

Lakeland was level with Leprino in March, but has slipped 0.42p/l behind, partly due to a smaller increase in base price (0.75p as opposed to 1p), but also because its volume bonuses are cut 50% between April and June each year.

Strathroy is at the bottom of the league despite a 1p increase to base, which took it to 29.5p/l. There are no volume bonuses factored into our Strathroy league price.

Rolling average

Included within our main league analysis is the rolling average paid to a 750,000l supplier by processors between May 2025 and April 2026.

Those rolling prices are all down by about 1p/l when compared to our March league, with prices of around 43p/l from April 2025 dropping out of the calculation.

Tirlán and Dale Farm are the only companies to have a rolling average now over 38p/l.

Payout

Shown in Figure 1 is our best estimate of the payout made by each processor to a 750,000l producer with a supply profile in line with the NI average, using the actual solids recorded by each company that month.

Those monthly payouts continue to rise as we approach peak production in May.

Tirlán has the highest butterfat and protein of all processors and when combined with its leading price, its April payout is over £1,000 ahead of second place.