The front-page story from the NI edition last week, which contrasted base milk prices offered by Irish co-ops to NI suppliers with those on offer to farmers south of the Irish border reflected some local concerns that prices here are not as strong as they perhaps could be.

Comparing prices north and south is something we are often asked to do by farmers. But with one system based on milk solids and the other based on litres supplied, an all-island milk league is difficult to produce, especially when you throw in the added complication of exchange rate movements.

While not disputing the figures presented last week, the point made by representatives who buy milk on both sides of the border is that in any attempt to compare prices, you also need to factor in bonuses paid in NI. That includes bonuses for winter milk, and in particular, for volume, which are not on offer to southern suppliers.

It means that a 1m litre supplier of average quality milk in NI, routinely gets over 0.5p/l above base each month.

On that basis, and given that farms in NI are generally larger and with a flat production profile (including winter milk), co-ops argue that the payouts on a per litre basis are higher to farmers in NI over the course of a year, than to southern Irish suppliers. According to one of the co-ops, the difference historically averages around 1.1p/l to 1.2p/l.

What cannot be disputed is that the entry of southern Ireland based co-ops into the NI market has brought added competition while also incentivising and facilitating expansion on many farms. It has been to the longer-term benefit of NI milk producers.

Also, looking back at milk league results over the past five years, most southern Irish co-ops have performed strongly, especially in the main benchmarks, such as the 12-month rolling average for average quality milk.