Further Increase In U.K. Milk Production Forecast

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28354, 13 August 1957, Page 17

Further Increase In U.K. Milk Production Forecast

A further increase in British milk production has been predicted by the chairman of the Milk Marketing Board of England and Wales, Sir Thomas Peacock, according to the latest bulletin of the New Zealand Dairy Mau keting Commission,

In the last nine years milk output in Britain has increased at an annual rate averaging 50 million gallons. ‘Cow numbers, however, have shown only a moderate rise, but yields have risen over the nine years by about 15 gallons a cow. The board was pushing sales of liquid milk, said Sir Thomas Peacock, but results Would neither be immediate nor spectacular, as consumption was at present at the high rate of five pints a head a week. Furthermore, the price of milk to the public rose by $d on July 1 to 8d a pint. In the butter market the recent high prices have been accompanied by increases in margarine consumption, states the bulletin In the Netherlands, between 1938 and 1955. butter output declined by 27 per cent., while margarine production rose by nearly 250 per cent. In the same period butter production in France increased by 17 per cent., but output of margarine climbed by 140 per cent. In Britain, margarine sells at 60 per cent, the price of butter,

while ih most other West European countries, margarine sells for about 25 per cent .of the butter price. In the United States margarine is at about 40 per cent.' oi the butter price. The bulletin reports that the quantity of milk used for cheese manufacture in Britain in the five months to the end of May, 1957, was nearly 25 per cent, higher than the fllgure for the same period in 1956 and about 70 per cent, above the 1955 level.