IFA warns on quota price rises

SUGGESTIONS that milk quota may have residual value after 2015 are “pure, unsubstantiated speculation”, said IFA dairy chairman Kevin Kiersey this week, as he warned the price of quota will rise very substantially in co-ops where the supply-demand balance is tightest.

Kiersey said the imbalance is clear to see in the current milk quota trading phase, with 4,151 buyers — almost as many as in last year’s two phases — and only 222 sellers. “With less than four years left of the milk quota regime, farmers should decide how much to pay for quota on the basis of what they can afford, remembering all the time that the cost of super-levy is 28.6c/l,” said Mr Kiersey.

According to IFA, the European Commission has made it clear it has no plan to compensate farmers for loss of quota value. “For the next three quota years, it will only make sense to purchase quota to avoid superlevy,” said the dairy farmers’ spokesman.