Mr. Denis Murphy:

There has been a huge change in recent years. The milk is going to fewer and larger processors. There has been a big fall out in the number of plants. Within the past year alone, Donegal Creameries has gone out of the liquid milk trade, as has Wexford Creamery. A number of years ago, the Kerry Group got out of the liquid milk trade. The downward pressure from retailers is intense. In the past few weeks alone one of the biggest milk processors in the UK has begun the process of selling its liquid milk business to Müller, which also bought the Robert Wiseman Dairy two or three years ago. The latter company could not cope with the pressure from retailers in the liquid mild sector.