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18/01/2010
Expert Urges Farm Co-Operation
A leading UK agricultural specialist from Barclays Bank, Euryn Jones, will visit a group of Northern Ireland dairy producers tomorrow, and will challenge them to innovate and co-operate.
He will be in Markethill, Co Armagh to outline some of the challenges that face the sector in 2010 and throughout the next decade.
The bank's National Agricultural Specialist, said: "One of the reasons that the government has set out a twenty year food strategy is that global population is expected to grow significantly.
"As global population rises and economic growth returns, demand for food will inevitably rise and as a consequence there is every reason to be confident that food prices will also rise," he commented.
"But it is pretty unlikely that we will experience a steady upward gradient of farm prices over the next two decades.
"Volatility will continue to be a feature and the whole food supply chain will need to continue dealing with price fluctuations," he said, noting that, for farmers, the challenge is to improve profitability, by increasing income or reducing costs.
"Too few farmers know their costs of production and fewer still know how their production costs compare with other producers," he continued, insisting that cost efficiencies can be achieved on a number of fronts, one of those being collaboration as Euryn explained: "Where feasible farmers are starting to collaborate to reduce costs.
"For example four farms in southern England have joined forces to share one feeder wagon to feed their dairy herds – two herds are fed in the morning and two are fed in the afternoon.
"Previously each farm had invested in smaller, less efficient wagons. I'm also aware of farmers that have merged herds and invested in one efficient milking facility, rather than spend money on two smaller, less efficient units."
He also said that improving profits is rarely easy: "By working with other farmers and with other links in the food chain there is every reason to be optimistic that the new decade will provide more opportunities and prosperity than previous years did," he concluded.
(BMcC/GK)
He will be in Markethill, Co Armagh to outline some of the challenges that face the sector in 2010 and throughout the next decade.
The bank's National Agricultural Specialist, said: "One of the reasons that the government has set out a twenty year food strategy is that global population is expected to grow significantly.
"As global population rises and economic growth returns, demand for food will inevitably rise and as a consequence there is every reason to be confident that food prices will also rise," he commented.
"But it is pretty unlikely that we will experience a steady upward gradient of farm prices over the next two decades.
"Volatility will continue to be a feature and the whole food supply chain will need to continue dealing with price fluctuations," he said, noting that, for farmers, the challenge is to improve profitability, by increasing income or reducing costs.
"Too few farmers know their costs of production and fewer still know how their production costs compare with other producers," he continued, insisting that cost efficiencies can be achieved on a number of fronts, one of those being collaboration as Euryn explained: "Where feasible farmers are starting to collaborate to reduce costs.
"For example four farms in southern England have joined forces to share one feeder wagon to feed their dairy herds – two herds are fed in the morning and two are fed in the afternoon.
"Previously each farm had invested in smaller, less efficient wagons. I'm also aware of farmers that have merged herds and invested in one efficient milking facility, rather than spend money on two smaller, less efficient units."
He also said that improving profits is rarely easy: "By working with other farmers and with other links in the food chain there is every reason to be optimistic that the new decade will provide more opportunities and prosperity than previous years did," he concluded.
(BMcC/GK)
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