The ban on importation of liquid milk is essential

From Eamon Fenlon, managing director, Jersey Dairy.

I REFER to the article re the dairy industry (JEP, 24 January).

Jersey Dairy is the commercial arm of the Jersey Milk Marketing Board that was set up under the Milk Marketing Scheme 1954 Act to represent the interests of all the Island’s dairy farmers and to regulate the supply of milk in the Island.

This Act, together with Jersey’s laws relating to the ban on the import of milk effectively gave Jersey Dairy a monopoly on liquid milk. This monopoly was created to protect the Island’s iconic breed of pedigree cow and the Island’s countryside, to ensure that Jersey remained self-sufficient in vital staple food. The JMMB is now a voluntary Co-op.

Comparing the retail price of milk in Jersey, produced and processed in Jersey from pedigree Jersey cows, with the retail price of milk in the UK, produced and processed in the UK with milk primarily from Holstein cows, is not a fair comparison. The quality of Jersey milk is far superior: Jersey milk contains 20% more protein and calcium and has a higher concentration of other minerals and vitamins than the milk from Holstein cows.

If the ban on the importation of liquid milk was lifted it could result in cheaper Holstein milk from the UK on our shop shelves. The significantly higher farming and processing costs in Jersey would mean that Jersey Dairy would have difficulty competing on price alone and assuming that consumers switched to the imported milk in significant numbers, then in such a scenario the dairy industry in Jersey would have great difficulty surviving at all.

The elimination of dairy farming in Jersey would have a major negative impact on the Jersey countryside which is a place of beauty, recreation and culture that is hugely important to everyone, residents and tourists, and not just those who live there.

Dairy farming has a positive impact on the environment and countryside.

Many of the hedgerows that are such an important and distinctive component of the landscape and biodiversity owe their existence to the need to divide grassland into conveniently-sized grazing pastures for dairy cattle. As well as providing shelter for livestock, these hedgerows create an ideal habitat for many of our farmland bird and wildlife species.

Jersey Dairy remains committed to minimising the gap between the retail price of milk in Jersey, produced and processed in Jersey by Jersey residents, with milk from pedigree Jersey cows, and the retail price of milk in the UK produced and processed in the UK with inferior milk primarily from Holstein cows. Our strategy is to grow the export sales of Jersey Dairy’s superb award winning products, produced at our new facility in Trinity, to spread our costs to enable us to minimise the gap.

I hope the above information gives you a clearer understanding of the current situation of the dairy industry in Jersey and demonstrates that having cheaper milk from the UK in Jersey and having Jersey’s brown cows in Jersey’s green fields are not mutually exclusive.