Tel: 028 3026 2311 | www.lakeland.ie | Twitter: @DairiesJP

TOGETHER WE’RE STRONGER

July 2020

Why we all need to move to Chlorine-free washes

1

The clear message from the pub-lic health experts is that as the econ-omy and society reopens, the threat of COVID-19 has not gone away.

We want to assure our 3,200 farm families that everyone in Lake-land Dairies continues to operate on full alert in order to keep your milk collected and processed while serv-ing our network of customers in some 80+ countries. As a business, we are taking every proactive step to keep all our sites safe and opera-tional.

When COVD-19 was declared a global pandemic in March, the focus for everyone in Lakeland Dairies was to keep our farmers and farm fami-lies as well as our staff, hauliers and customers safe.

Thus far, everyone has put in a tremendous effort in tackling CO-VID-19 but the threat has not gone away – we all must remain vigilant and operate to the highest possible hygiene and safety standards.

Keeping the wheels of the busi-ness turning during the peak spring milk season has been absolutely critical.

We have been asked by farmers

how they can do their bit to keep CO-VID-19 out of the business and the answer is simple – hygiene.

Washing your hands and keeping surfaces that you and your haulier come in contact with clean is essen-tial in the fight against COVID-19.PROCEDURES

At the outbreak of COVID-19, we wrote to you with our operational procedures to ensure the highest hygiene standards on your farm. If you need a copy of these procedures, please contact Member Relations.

We are asking all farmers and hauliers to continue to:

• Wash your hands regularly. •Do not come in contact with

your milk collection or feed / fertil-iser haulier.

• Sanitise the areas that you and your milk haulier come in contact with such as the dairy door handles, the bulk tank, etc.

• Have a source of soap, hot water, paper towels and a bin for your milk collection or feed / fertiliser haulier to thoroughly wash their hands.

By following these simple steps, you will greatly reduce the spread of COVID-19.

If you or anyone in your family / involved in the running of your farm contract COVID-19, it is IMPERA-TIVE that you contact Member Rela-tions immediately.

Your situation will be dealt with in the strictest confidence. Lakeland Dairies milk hauliers have received training and advice in how to safely collect milk from farms that have cases of COVID-19.

Any failure to inform us of a case of COVID-19 on your farm or in your family is incredibly serious and puts our entire business at risk.

We are here to work with you and we are asking you to do the same.

We know that the vast majority of farmers are adhering to the pro-cedures aimed at protecting you, your family, your staff and the whole Lakeland Dairies business. We are sincerely thankful and grateful for your efforts.

Thank you and stay well,

Eamon DuignanGeneral Manager, Member Relations

Chlorine free washes is something for all farmers > page 2

Staying alert to COVID-19 threat

We all must remain

vigilant and operate to the highest

possible hygiene

and safety standards.

2

TOGETHER WE’RE STRONGER

Lakeland Dairies has been rolling out the Red Tractor Assurance Scheme among milk suppliers since May 2019.

In that time, 95% have signed up to the scheme and our dedicated Red Tractor team have worked hand-in-hand with farmers to make the audit process as seamless as possible.

Red Tractor is the UK’s largest farm and food standards scheme and covers food safe-ty, animal welfare, environmental protection, traceability and sustainability.

Red Tractor is now the minimum entry point for our engagement with many cus-tomers who are looking to ensure the highest standards of food production. It is an absolute necessity to supply many of the customers in some 80+ global markets we service.

As you are aware a 0.5p/litre penalty was to be introduced on milk supplies from the start of this year for farms who were not Red Tractor certified.

In order to deal with the large volumes of farmers who applied to the scheme, the imple-mentation of the penalty was delayed to get maximum participation.

From 1st September 2020, a 0.5p/litre pen-alty will be introduced on milk supplies from farms which are not fully certified

To begin the registration process,, please contact your local Lakeland Dairies Red Trac-tor Advisor.

• Jennifer Prue – 07767 846350 – Tyrone/Fermanagh/Armagh

• Ian Olphert – 07525 897746 – Londonderry/Derry/Antrim/Down

Red Tractor changes £11m fund support for dairy farmersFollowing lobbying from the Dairy

Council of Northern Ireland (DCNI) with strategic assistance from Lakeland Dairies, DAERA has announced an £11m support for dairy farmers in Northern Ireland.

The fund is part of an overall package of £25m for Northern Ireland dairy, beef, sheep and horticulture farmers who had market losses as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

DAERA has allocated the fund to cover 80% of losses in the dairy, potato and hor-ticulture sectors, but 100% of losses in the beef and sheep sectors.

Minister Edwin Poots unveiled the de-tails of the scheme in recent weeks.

Dairy farmers will receive supports of between 1p/l and 1.2p/l for all milk supplied between March and June.

The reference price for the support has been set at 26.7p/l which is an average price based on all milk collected in February.

Payments will not be made on milk pro-duced but not sold to the processors with DAERA saying farmers’ insurance will be able to mitigate losses in this regard.

Milk prices on fixed milk price scheme under the reference price of 26.7p/l would have been eligible but DAERA has indicated that there are no contracts under the refer-ence price.

Further details on the scheme are antici-pated in the coming weeks with DAEARA expected to make payments for March, April and May in August with the pay-ment for June milk expected to be made in September.

DAERA has indicated that the applica-tion process will be straightforward.

We are continuing to encourage suppliers towards moving to receiving their milk statements via email.

We are grateful to those who have answered our call looking for email addresses. The move to a more digitally-focussed way of communicating with you will continue in the coming weeks and months.

Distribution of your monthly milk statements as well as circulation of the monthly Farm Notes and other technical advice will be moving fully online in time.

We appreciate that some of you may not have access to an email address so we would encourage you to provide us with the email address of your spouse or partner or a close relative who you trust.

We strongly encourage you to contact Member Relations with your email address.Please contact Member Relations on 028 3026 2311 for more information on the

emailing of milk statements or email memberrelations@lakeland.ie with your sup-plier number to register.

Continuing to move milk statements online

Why we need to keep chlorine freeWe would like to remind farmers to

continue to take a proactive approach when it comes to reducing chlorates and TCM residues in milk. High standards for infant formula and butter products require us to eliminate chlorates and TCMs in milk.

The removal of chlorine from cleaning routines would significantly reduce the risk of these residues in milk and, consequently, residue levels in these final products like butter and infant formula.

Farmers have made great inroads, but it continues to be a huge challenge for the sector and levels remain stubbornly high.

In recent days you will have received a text from us containing a video on how farmers can move to chlorine-free. In the video, farmer Padraig Lynch explains how his farm has made the switch with no distruption while maintaining hygiene and quality standards.

For further information on making the switch to chlorine-free washes, contact Member Relations on 028 3026 2311.

3

TOGETHER WE’RE STRONGER

The importance of drying-off cows Drying off cows can be seen as a tedious and time-consuming job but is probably one of the most important jobs of the year. Niall McCarron offers tips and advice for getting it right.

The dry period is an opportunity for cows to prepare for the next lactation and it also allows the mammary tissue time to repair.

Get it right and it offers the opportunity to potentially cure cows with mastitis and permanently lower the SCC of the herd. However, get it wrong and quarters can be lost or cows get very sick.

Preparation is key to the whole drying off process.

Ideally you should have milk recorded during their lactation and kept information on individual cows to know which ones have been infected.

If a milk sample from an infected cow was cultured in a lab by your vets, this will help to determine which bugs are actually causing the mastitis infection and allows us to choose the most appropriate antibiotic to use at drying off.

Depending on the information available, the decision can then be made whether to use a blanket treatment, giving antibiotics to the entire herd, or selective dry cow therapy where only a portion of high cell count cows and cows with infections are treated.

Sealers are a must where selective dry cow therapy is practised.

Most farmers are using sealers even where blanket treatment is practised. HYGIENE IS KEY

Ideally have cows’ tails clipped two to three weeks in advance of drying off. On the actual day of drying off the critical thing is hygiene and not rushing.

Identify and separate cows during the morning milking.

Small batches should be done in a day, 10 to 20 depending on help and treatment type.

Hose down and clean milking parlour af-ter milking before starting drying off process.

Wear gloves and disinfect the teat end well before inserting dry cow tube/sealer.

The only way that bacteria can get into the udder is through the teat end and, if the teat end isn’t clean, there’s a risk that you are going to push dirt up in front of the tube when you’re administering the antibiotic into the udder.

It is recommended to use a piece of cotton wool dipped in methylated spirits to clean the teat ends for 10 seconds. Should the cotton wool be dirty after cleaning, the process should be repeated.

Ideally cows should go out to a dry field for a week but if this is not possible cubicles need to be kept very clean and dry.

GENERAL ADVICE FOR DRYING-OFF• Ensure cows’ tails are clipped prior

to drying-off.• Ensure a 60 day dry period for

cows – plan to get high yielding cows re-duced in yield well before drying off.

• The use of a good head torch/lamp can increase visibility.

• Keep the number of cows to be treated to a manageable number i.e. 20 per person per day if using antibiotic only and 10 per person per day if using both antibiotic and sealer.

• Put cows in clean areas after treat-ment and maintain a clean environment during the dry-cow period to avoid picking up new infections.

• Regularly check cows during the dry-cow period for signs of mastitis.

• Check each cow that received antibiotic dry cow therapy has passed her minimum dry period when she calves, and withhold milk from the bulk tank for the period specified by the product.

• Withhold milk from all cows from the bulk tank for at least eight milkings after calving to ensure that no colostrum or transition milk goes into the tank. This also prevents teat seal treatments from entering the bulk tank.

If you have any queries on dry-ing off, contact the Lakeland Dairies Member Relation team on 028 3026 2311.

It is important to have dry cow tubes and sealers nearby.

Ideally you should have

milk recorded during their

lactation and kept

information on individual

cows to know which ones have been infected.

4

TOGETHER WE’RE STRONGER

Contact The Lakeland Dairies Member Relations Division works closely with all our milk producers to help drive profitability at farm level as well as providing infor-mation on the progress of the Society. We are always excited to hear from new entrants. Contact us by calling 1890 47 47 20 (ROI) or 028 3026 2311 (NI).

As we come to the end of the 2020 peak milk production season, weak demand, coupled with a slowly recovering food service sector, are impacting the markets.

Last month we wrote about a floor having entered the market following the collapse in prices as a result of the COVID-19 pan-demic.

This floor was welcomed as it stabilised markets after weeks of free-fall.

However, since then, there has been little in the way of activ-ity from buyers to further drive the market forward.

Prices for all the main butter and powder products have re-mained broadly inline with where they were last month.FOOD SERVICE REOPENING

The global food service sector has slowly started to awaken after its shutdown to help curb the spread of COVID-19.

While the return of flights, hotels, cafes, restaurants, etc is welcome, social distancing guidelines mean that customer capacity is down. With fewer cus-tomers, buyers need fewer dairy products. PRODUCTION

On production, European supply is kicking into growth after drought conditions over the summer while New Zealand is forecasting growth as its new season commences now.

US farmers are continued to be supported by Donald Trump to grow output in the face of weak demand.

Lakeland Dairies will continue to monitor the market closely in the coming weeks and months ahead.

Demand drag on markets

Keeping on top of grass growthGoing from dry conditions to a period of

prolonged heavy rain has made grass manage-ment a challenge in the last number of weeks.

At the time of writing, we have individual farms recording growth rates of up to 120kg dry matter per hectare (DM/Ha).

Compounding this is the limited oppor-tunity for cutting surplus grass out as bales meaning that covers on paddocks are going too strong and not coming back into rotation soon enough.

Thankfully, it seems better weather is forecast and these strong paddocks (>3,000kg DM/ha) will get cut and back growing for cows.

Average growth rates on GrassCheck farms are in the region of 80kg DM/ha/day so supply is well above demand at present. GRASS QUALITY

With grass growth rates on the majority of farms now exceeding demand (in some cases double demand) maintaining quality within paddocks is presenting a major challenge.

It is vitally important to take appropriate action to ensure cows continue to be offered high quality swards for grazing.

Cows need to walk into covers of no more than 3,000kg DM/ha total cover every day to maintain good milk yield.

Therefore, paddocks need to be walked on a regular basis, i.e twice weekly in periods of high growth.

Covers of over 3,000kgDM/ha should be skipped over and taken out as surplus bales. Pre-mowing stronger covers is not the ideal as this ends up wasting feed and still means cows are not eating optimal grass covers. It is better to mow and remove in bales.

Failure to remove surplus will hit the bulk tank with reduced milk yield and will also leave grass quality issues on the next grazing.

The question is often asked about when to take paddocks out if there doesn’t seem to be a suitable weather window to get bales made dry.

We have all seen this in last two weeks (late June/early July).

The important thing to remember here is you are removing paddocks in order to correct a grass surplus on the milking platform; to ensure milking cows are offered the best grass possible on your farm.

The quality of the subsequent bales is not the priority in this scenario.

What is most important is that the grass that has gotten too strong is removed quickly so the paddock can begin to grow better quality grass once again.

Where no removal of surplus grass as silage has occurred, grass quality will remain poor for a longer period.

There is no option but to top these pad-docks after their next grazing.

Cows grazing these paddocks will need higher levels of supplementation for a longer period as the energy content in these paddocks with a lot of stem will be quite low.

With high growth rates it is critically important that you continue to walk the farm regularly to quickly identify a surplus.TIPS WHEN GROWTH IS GOOD

When grass growth rates are high there are some general rules that should be applied.

1) Shorten rotation length to match growth rates. 16-18 days when growth rates up at 80kgs DM/Ha.

2) Increase demand by matching supple-mentation levels to farm grass supply

3) Remove surpluses in the form of bales. Remove immediately to ensure ground is com-ing back into the rotation.

4) Continue to apply fertiliser.