Barthélémy Philippe, edited by Alexandre Dalifard / Photo credit: MAYLIS ROLLAND / HANS LUCAS / HANS LUCAS VIA AFP 6:44 a.m., February 1, 2024

While farmers' anger is growing, particularly with the rise of tractors in Rungis and the Paris region, dairy farmers seem to be experiencing a much more complicated situation in their profession. Today, they receive around 40 cents per liter of milk.

Dairy farmers, poor relations of French agriculture? Over the last 20 years, the average price of a liter of semi-skimmed milk in supermarkets has increased by almost 50% and is now close to one euro. The problem is that this increase has had only a small impact on the income of breeders. 

Dairy producers today receive around 40 cents per liter. The margins are unfortunately more flattering for the food industry and mass distribution. They are the ones who transform milk into products (butter, yogurt, cheese, etc.) and that is where prices rise.

Penalized by Lactalis

In addition, dairy producers are penalized by the concentration of the sector in the wake of the world number one, Lactalis, explains Elyne Etienne, livestock manager at the Foundation for Nature and Man. “We have seven companies with a huge majority in the processing to produce dairy products, so that gives a very unfavorable balance of power to breeders. When we negotiate with only seven companies, we are not really in control of how we produce and for whom we sells", she laments at the microphone of Europe 1.

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But breeders have another problem. Butter, yogurt, cheese... Most of the time, they do not know in what form or at what prices their raw material is sold. "As long as we don't have this transparency, it's really difficult for breeders to negotiate. Because ultimately, they know how much they are paid for a liter of milk. But then, everything that is done with this milk and how much the different products are sold for, they are completely unaware of that,” explains Elyne Etienne. The result is breeders who work 60 hours a week, for a salary barely above the minimum wage.