Milk production in NI totalled 2.525bn litres in 2022, down 0.5% or 15 million litres on 2021 volumes.
It is the first time since 2016 that the NI milk pool has contracted year on year. Despite this, annual milk production in 2022 is still the second-highest on record for NI.
Analysis of monthly volumes shows that from January to April of last year, milk production was running above 2021 levels, with 896.6m litres processed compared to 881.8m litres. But from May to December 2022, monthly volumes were consistently lower than the previous year with 1.624bn litres produced compared to 1.658bn litres in 2021.
Average price
The DAERA analysis also shows the average farmgate milk price for 2022 is 44.53p/l, significantly higher than the 31.62p/l in 2021 and 27.08p/l back in 2020.
December milk price averaged 51.92p/l, fractionally higher than the November price, but 15.4p/l above December 2021 levels.
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