Fonterra Cuts 2026/27 Milk Price Forecast to $9.25
Fonterra has reduced its forecast 2026/27 Farmgate Milk Price.
Fonterra aspires to play a global leadership role in reducing biological emissions in dairy, says Francesca Eggleton, the co-op’s group environment manager.
New Zealand is among the most emissions-efficient producers of milk, Eagleton told ‘Facing Disruption’, the recent Australia-New Zealand Climate Change and Business Conference in Auckland.
She says we can share knowledge and innovation while helping reduce domestic emissions. Dairy produces 25% of NZ’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Innovation will play a key role in addressing the problem.
“We clearly have a role to play in meeting the Paris agreement. Fonterra is NZ’s second-largest user of coal so again, we clearly have a role to play,” Eagleton says.
Fonterra’s vision for 2050 is to get its fossil fuel emissions down to net zero.
“We need to nail soil carbon storage and methane storage as well. We need to nail precision farming and keep working with our farmers to help them lower their environmental footprint.”
Eagleton says along with Fonterra’s 2050 targets it also has shorter-term targets. More information on those will be coming out shortly.
Last year, with the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, Fonterra signed the dairy declaration setting out the key role dairy has to play in the UN sustainable development goals -- including climate action and livelihoods.
Dairy is a huge provider of livelihoods – and food security – in rural communities, Eagleton points out.
“We would like to say ‘nutritional security’ because it is not the calories that matter, it is how much nutrition you are getting and dairy is extremely nutritious.”
Collaboration is the key and Fonterra has partnered with DairyNZ on the Dairy for Climate Change Action Plan which sets out a framework for how the dairy industry will contribute to the Paris agreement.
“It is a phased approach and the first phase is very much focused on getting the foundations right. It is about making sure we’ve got the right education and awareness, demonstration farms, pilot measurement and then continuing to work on what that looks like.”
Fonterra has reduced its forecast 2026/27 Farmgate Milk Price.
New Zealand dairy farmers are set to be the first in the world to receive access to a new digital physical milk pricing tool that enables them to fix the price for their physical milk.
State farmer Pāmu is opening its farm gates this summer in an effort to give the rural sector the opportunity to see how large-scale, multi-system farming is delivering productivity and profitability across New Zealand.
A five-year study has found that the cost of reducing emissions without technology may be significant and unsustainable for Northland dairy farmers.
DairyNZ says Waikato farmers need certainty on Plan Change 1, but they say that certainty must be matched with practical, workable rules and a clear transition that doesn't get ahead of the new resource management system currently under review.
While the Government has moved quickly to make commercial hauliers' lot easier during the current fuel crisis, they appear to be stuck in the creep box when it comes to the agricultural industry.

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