Fischler: Dairy markets to stay demand-driven after financial crisis

DAIRY markets will remain demand-driven even after the present financial crisis, the former EU agriculture commissioner Franz Fischler said when he addressed the centenary celebrations of the Tipperary Co-op yesterday. The co-op has an annual turnover of €150 million.

He said markets will continue to be determined by consumption patterns and population growth across the world.

On the world markets, he said the OECD and the Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) foresee that the medium-term outlook remains dominated by substantial expansion in global demand for dairy products.

Mr Fischler, speaking at Dundrum House Hotel in Co Tipperary, said demand growth is projected to be the strongest in the non-OECD zone, most notably southern Asia, the Far East and north Africa.

But a significant part of this increasing demand is expected to be met by domestic production. The European dairy sector should try to meet the interests of the wealthier parts of the emerging societies, he said. Mr Fischler said it is important to start now to prepare a good future for the European dairy sector after 2013 and even more so after 2015 when its dairy quota system will come to an end.

Tipperary Co-op chairman Matthew Quinlan paid tribute to the vision and commitment of the dairy farmers who founded the society 100 years ago in order to control their own business.

General manager Ted O’Connor said the reasons for the co-operative way of doing business were as relevant today as they were 100 years ago. He urged the co-op’s umbrella body, ICOS, to reform and energise the commitment of farmers owning and controlling their own business through the exercise of co-operative principles.

Tipperary Co-op , which has 450 milk suppliers and employs 300 people, opened a new specialised continental cheese plant early last year.