Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 15 January 2015

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Dairy Sector: Irish Dairy Board

10:10 am

Mr. Bernard Condon:

It is something we need to be conscious of but we need to put Ireland's growth in the context of international growth. The 50% growth we are looking at is about 2.7 billion litres over a nine-year period from 2011. If we look at what New Zealand has done in the past two or three years, with its 10% growth off a 20 billion litre base, it is at or around increasing production annually at the same rate we are talking about increasing production over a five to ten-year period. The US is forecast to be up about 3% this year and, again, that is an extra 2.7 billion litres onto the world market. Therefore, although the 50% looks massive from our perspective, we are less than 1% of global milk supply and less than 3.5% of European milk supply. All else being equal, if markets are performing appropriately, the demand growth will certainly be able to cater for our increase in production.