The Guardian has several stories on the plight of the British Dairy industry today. It’s really rather odd actually, as they manage to identify the problem itself but then seem not to notice that they have.

That means British farmers have to compete on the global commodity
markets, where prices have been weak. Other countries may have lower
production costs and exchange rates may favour them. At the same time,
reform of the Common Agricultural Policy has cut subsidies that used to
protect EU farmers from the global market. "If we sell 7bn litres of
milk a year to the commodity markets the reality is that that’s what
will set the base price for British milk," Wiseman’s communications
director, Graeme Jack, says.

And:

Kemble Farms is one of the most efficient dairy operations in the
country. The cows give so much milk they are emptied three times a day.
Yields are typically 9,000 litres per cow per year, not the highest
known since some farms have now broken the 10,000-litre barrier, but a
long way above average and spectacular compared with a decade ago, when
average yields were nearer 5,000 litres per cow. Thirty years earlier,
average yields were 3,500 litres.

So, we’ve got productivity rising strongly. We also have at best, static levels of consumption, if not falling.

It’s not really all that tough to figure out what’s going on, is it? More is being supplied, as has been going on since farming was first invented, and the same or lesser amount is being demanded, so the price therefore goes down.

What we’re being told, in the rather brutal manner that markets do such things, is that the 24,000 or so dairy farmers (that’s for England I think) are some thousands too many and that at least some of them should go off and do something else.

So, err, why not do that instead of complaining?