The call to action comes as Arla announced on 23 February that it will be dropping its UK milk price by 2.16ppl. Since December, Arla farmers have seen a total drop of 5.19ppl.
NFU dairy board chairman Michael Oakes said: “I’m disappointed and surprised to see this level of price drop despite a stable demand for butter and the UK Futures Market Equivalent showing a positive result on the forward curve.
“We will soon see Arla’s seasonality pricing mechanism lower the pence per litre received even more.
“Just this week at the NFU Conference, Arla announced a growth in revenue of £1.94bn. Arla farmers don’t appear to be feeling the positive effects of this revenue or the strategy to manage risk in the market. We want to see more done at both ends of the chain to insulate farmers from such steep price drops.
“It is vital that Arla works with farmers to provide them with the ability to mitigate the effects of volatility on their businesses. We are holding Arla UK’s managing director Tomas Pietrangeli to his commitment made at NFU Conference to look into risk management options for Arla suppliers. We are calling on Arla to speed up this work so farmers can see the results.”
The NFU Dairy Board is due to meet with Arla later in the year and will be reinforcing this call.