Balancing English milk requirements

Tuesday, 18 August 2020

By Chris Gooderham

English milk production is estimated at 9,076 million litres for 2019/20, just 0.2% higher than the level estimated in 2018/19.

During the year, we estimate English manufacturers processed 10,285 million litres of milk, meaning the country was around 88% self-sufficient. Liquid milk production continued to dominate, accounting for around 56% of total manufacturing volumes. Cheese accounted for a further 19%.

The last official milk production figures in GB by country were produced in 2014/15 by the RPA. Over the last few years we have estimated milk production by using milking herd numbers and an estimate of yields. The milking herd in England reduced to 1,131K head in 2019, a 12K head year-on-year decrease. Yields are estimated to have averaged 8,029 litres per cow in 2019/20, up 1.3% on the previous year.

Milk balances for Wales and Scotland are also available.

Image of staff member Chris Gooderham

Chris Gooderham

Science and Environment Director

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