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Defying even the expressed wishes of their own customers, Coles and other supermarket chains continue to pay dairy farmers so little that they can then sell that milk for $1 per litre!
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With Queensland experiencing a deficit in milk production, One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson has threatened to abstain from lending her support to non-critical legislation until the price of milk is regulated. Between the drought, rising input costs and low farmgate milk prices, Queensland dairy farmers are culling herds or getting out of the game altogether, with the number of dairies in the state collapsing from 1,500 at the time of deregulation, to 385 today.
Only re-regulating the industry will rescue Australia’s collapsing milk production. Milk production doubled in the two decades from 1980-2000, but since deregulation took effect in 2000 it has fallen consistently. Fourth-generation dairy farmer from Rush Creek in Queensland, Joe Bradley, told Channel 9’s Today program on 25 September that if milk production drops to 8 billion litres as expected this year, it would make a 30 per cent drop since peak production (2002), and Australia would be set to become a net importer of dairy products.
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