Dairy Chit Chat- Please read Mod note in post #1

Dawggone

Markcheese wrote: »

Would the price of milk be more or less the same as it is if quotas were still in force... largely, the europeans are bit players on the world traded market for milk... (I know the difference between surplus quantities traded (high prices) and deficit quantities traded (low prices) can be miniscule) , but quota really had to go ... poor prices have been here before.. its a cyclical business... (oil hit 50 dollars a barrel today, hits the yanks and the europeans,)

One year in 31....not bad.

It's the EU that's really kicked on.
300k tons of surplus in storage?


Get rid of intervention. Let the market decide.
When Coops have to store or dump, price will plummet...the long slow death by a thousand cuts is not helping.

You either have quota control or markets.
Europeans are well cushioned with SFP.

Intervention is another version of quota and helping the kiwis etc.

Milked out

Would it be easier to survive a shorter more severe fall or the long slow drawn out. The long drawn out one could have lads using whatever buffer they have to keep going for longer but by the final drop there may be nothing left whereas the shorter sharper fall may be more survivable, assuming it goes back up some bit of course

freedominacup

Dawggone wrote: »

Any idea of those products Free?

Not really dawg but it's generally veg protein replacing dairy protein from what I understand.

Milked out

Some part of the Ras went by earlier in the day there and between the sirens and horns they drove the cows daft. Haunted they didn't break out, and the cows weren't even near the road

Water John

Yeah, often had problems with the two car rallies but I always liked sport. Lost a heifer one year.
Two riders had broken away early, fair fecks if they thought they would get all the ways to Dungarvan. Hoor of a sport. And farmers thought they had a hard day.

stanflt

Water John wrote: »

Yeah Sam, expanded quite a lot through the 70's after EEC membership. There was a lot more potential for expansion after 1983 but quota put a stop to that.
If we had another 10 years at that time, we would have built serious capacity.

Here's another way of looking at it- European quotas helped New Zealand to grow its industry without competition- this in turn caused over supply- if New Zealand had of been competing against a quota free Europe would they have got so strong- I fear that oz and New Zealand's industry was supports by pillars which are crumbling-,these pillars were called quota

kowtow

stanflt wrote: »

are crumbling-,these pillars were called quota

Quite, that's what has been nagging me since yesterday... by artificially restraining the supply of milk quota made what was normally a waste / surplus product so hard to come by (for a short number of years) that it actually looked like a business in itself.

Government intervention in markets really doesn't ever, ever, produce the results that all those good intentions want it to.

Dawggone

stanflt wrote: »

Here's another way of looking at it- European quotas helped New Zealand to grow its industry without competition- this in turn caused over supply- if New Zealand had of been competing against a quota free Europe would they have got so strong- I fear that oz and New Zealand's industry was supports by pillars which are crumbling-,these pillars were called quota

Not crumbling fast enough. Intervention is quota in another guise.
By right, if a true market existed (without intervention), any commodity trader would short EU milk and long on NZ milk...arbitrage.

blackdog1

stanflt wrote:

Here's another way of looking at it- European quotas helped New Zealand to grow its industry without competition- this in turn caused over supply- if New Zealand had of been competing against a quota free Europe would they have got so strong- I fear that oz and New Zealand's industry was supports by pillars which are crumbling-,these pillars were called quota

I agree. There should be world quotas...it's not like if there was an undersupply that we couldn't fill the gap in 1 month. Problem is everyone expects Europe to save them at their own expense.

Water John

Well, as Stan points out rightly, we gave them a free ride for 30 years. Left them expand as much as they like. They now complain about us.
It should always have been a production licience here. No tradeable value.
Use it or lose it.
Might go that way after the correction.

kowtow

Water John wrote: »

Well, as Stan points out rightly, we gave them a free ride for 30 years. Left them expand as much as they like. They now complain about us.
It should always have been a production licience here. No tradeable value.
Use it or lose it.
Might go that way after the correction.

A production licence would still have unforeseen effects.

If I couldn't trade the licence I'd have to imply the price of the licence inside whatever gave the licence in the first place.. land .. cows.. whatever...

If one wanted to take up milking, where would one get the production rights?

Free markets are probably the best answer, they just might not be enough to sustain our current massive dairy farming capacity at a viable price.

whelan2

stanflt wrote: »

Here's another way of looking at it- European quotas helped New Zealand to grow its industry without competition- this in turn caused over supply- if New Zealand had of been competing against a quota free Europe would they have got so strong- I fear that oz and New Zealand's industry was supports by pillars which are crumbling-,these pillars were called quota

Hows your brother fairing out in NZ must be fairly tough over there?

Milked out

Dairygold announced deal with TINE a norweigian coop to supply milk to cheese facility to be built in mogeely alongside existing plant. Jarlsberg cheese If anyone knows of it

Water John

Licence would be Govn't issued
What parameters? Could have a range of factors, environmental being the key one. Options for addons include GM free, grass based, right up to organic.

No point though if we are directly competing with the worlds LCD. It has to be attached to premium quality. That would take time.
A parallel would be how Bulmers moved cider away from being a cheap drink for down and outs to a premium niche product.

TINE was mentioned at the AGM. Wish them the best with it. Their record with Jalsberg doesn't bode well though. At least €20M thrown at that. No production this year.

freedominacup

Water John wrote: »

Licence would be Govn't issued
What parameters? Could have a range of factors, environmental being the key one. Options for addons include GM free, grass based, right up to organic.

No point though if we are directly competing with the worlds LCD. It has to be attached to premium quality. That would take time.
A parallel would be how Bulmers moved cider away from being a cheap drink for down and outs to a premium niche product.

Bulmers got their clocks cleaned by the incumbents within a couple of years though.

kowtow

Water John wrote: »

Licence would be Govn't issued
What parameters? Could have a range of factors, environmental being the key one. Options for addons include GM free, grass based, right up to organic.

No point though if we are directly competing with the worlds LCD. It has to be attached to premium quality.

I don't understand how those could be grounds for issuing a production licence. It sounds as though a certain level of licence would be issued based on land farmed, depending on the farming system? .. in which case the licence would simply become a land pricing factor.. in the way that nitrates or entitlements are.

We should certainly be looking for premium quality markets & production but if we had them, there would be little need for licences. In premium markets the customer & demand level is enough to govern output, because the whole industry works around a much higher milk price level than the one we are currently enduring.

If we all demanded premium products & liquid or local consumption for our milk, the price would certainly be higher, but I suspect there would only be 10 or 20% of the cows that we have today.

Edit: There is one application for production licences, and that is to effectively tie a limited milk pool under contract at a premium price - i.e. pay a premium price for the first x litres (linked to production rights) and if a farmer wants to overproduce let him, but pay the spot price for the milk. From time to time some farmers could do very well with that spot price, but those who wanted to stay within the old limits wouldn't be subsidising the overproduction of expanding farmers.

mf240

I dont think we need quota. We need to stop intervention and let it bottom out. Once it recovers (if and when) the last thing we need is to be shackled by quota and unable to cash in.
Governments need to keep out of the market.

stanflt

whelan2 wrote: »

Hows your brother fairing out in NZ must be fairly tough over there?

He's surviving just like the rest of us- he's been to many meetings of different organisations and each meeting is telling them that it will get better but they need Europe to reinstall quotas- each commentator is blaming Europe for their low milk price but fails to say that their industry only became prosperous due to quota in Europe

The realists over their are very fearful of the output that is actually achievable from European farmers- to a point where the kiwi farmers have realised that they aren't really low cost producers at all

Water John

Would agree with your Edit part Kowtow.

The world of globalisation is not a very nice one. With milk, the long run in time to slow down or ramp up production makes responding to price, using the old supply/demand balance is not reacted to in the classic way by the primary producer. Case in point ATM, production increasing by farmers trying to keep the cheque coming in each month as large as possible.

pedigree 6

mf240 wrote: »

I dont think we need quota. We need to stop intervention and let it bottom out. Once it recovers (if and when) the last thing we need is to be shackled by quota and unable to cash in.
Governments need to keep out of the market.

I read in the journal that as soon as intervention opened the French put a load of powder into it and their price was still 30 cents when they did so. Reducing the amount of product on their market for this year giving themselves a big cushion on price and reducing the amount that Ireland could put in it.

kowtow

Water John wrote:

The world of globalisation is not a very nice one. With milk, the long run in time to slow down or ramp up production makes responding to price, using the old supply/demand balance is not reacted to in the classic way by the primary producer. Case in point ATM, production increasing by farmers trying to keep the cheque coming in each month as large as possible.

Milk isn't the only commodity with a slow ramp up / ramp down in production.

Oil, for example, takes a little while to turn on and off - and supply and demand seems to work ok for that..

I'm being a little tongue in cheek of course but I'm afraid Irelands position is basically that of a highly geared producer looking for a market, and no amount of quota or production rights is going to keep our huge number of dairy farms in business long term if the world market price settles at a level incompatible with our high fixed cost environment, and the income expectations which go with it.

visatorro

whelan2 wrote: »

Just the ones with symptoms, the sippy top is better than a spray, wash them off first when they come in to parlour splash the stuff on and then milk them, that way it has about 10 minutes on the hoof clean before they go out. Do it for 6 milkings, although hoofcare man said 4-5 might be enough. Hate setting up footbath

I have formilin here still, I wonder is it worthwhile trying that method instead of the baths. Never used that other stuff before.

stanflt

visatorro wrote: »

I have formilin here still, I wonder is it worthwhile trying that method instead of the baths. Never used that other stuff before.

Had whelans hoof pearer here yesterday also-, got a great kill with only power washing feet once and spraying on heal max mixed with Linco twice- unbelievable results

keep going

kowtow wrote: »

Milk isn't the only commodity with a slow ramp up / ramp down in production.

Oil, for example, takes a little while to turn on and off - and supply and demand seems to work ok for that..

I'm being a little tongue in cheek of course but I'm afraid Irelands position is basically that of a highly geared producer looking for a market, and no amount of quota or production rights is going to keep our huge number of dairy farms in business long term if the world market price settles at a level incompatible with our high fixed cost environment, and the income expectations which go with it.

Excellent post, but with the caveat of political interference

freedominacup

Timmaay wrote: »

The bare 3wks AI done here, and I've let the bull on in with the cows. 80% served so far, not fantastic by most spring lads standards however the highest we have ever had it here. At least 4 missed heats also, paint not rubbed off fully and I jsut wasn't sure when they got rubbed off. Compact calving is good but without the autumn calvers the late spring calvers do a nice job to fill my January liquid quota. Will be roughly a 2k AI bill, will be interesting to see how many heifers I end up with next year! I'll be keeping an eye on the tailpaint for the next 3 weeks still, and will serve again if there are a flood of cows bulling and the bull becomes under pressure!

Tim that bull better be a hardy buck or you could find yourself in bother next spring. We have the same type of cow as you and it's only on the third round that bulling has really dropped off. Twenty a day one or two days a month ago heifers and cows to a couple every second day now. The second round was up and down numbers wise but no one bull would have handled it. Bull going in here Mon week after covering the third round on heifers, a kind of pre season tour for him. Hopefully he won't be too busy.

whelan2

stanflt wrote: »

Had whelans hoof pearer here yesterday also-, got a great kill with only power washing feet once and spraying on heal max mixed with Linco twice- unbelievable results

Think the footbath will be put away here

Markcheese

Milked out wrote:

Dairygold announced deal with TINE a norweigian coop to supply milk to cheese facility to be built in mogeely alongside existing plant. Jarlsberg cheese If anyone knows of it

Didnt they do that before... it didnt go well ... actually they were trying to produce it in there own plant ..
Jarlsberg is lovely cheese...
There was a dairygold supplier making his own raw milk version a couple of years back... I reckoned it was fantastic ..

kevthegaff

stanflt wrote: »

Had whelans hoof pearer here yesterday also-, got a great kill with only power washing feet once and spraying on heal max mixed with Linco twice- unbelievable results

What's heal max and what's do u and whelan spray it with? Sorry suck of footbath in too!

whelan2

kevthegaff wrote: »

What's heal max and what's do u and whelan spray it with? Sorry suck of footbath in too!

I just used the lincocin in a 2 litre lemonade bottle with a sippy water bottle top on the top, way better than spray as they are getting a good dollop each time

blackdog1

whelan2 wrote:

I just used the lincocin in a 2 litre lemonade bottle with a sippy water bottle top on the top, way better than spray as they are getting a good dollop each time

If you put licocin powder on the problem and bandage it you only have to apply once and cut bandage after a week. Totally clean.