A fair price for a farmer's milk Does Britain need dairy farmers? We think the answer to that question is an emphatic "Yes." Dairy farms give much of Britain's countryside its distinctive beauty. The production of milk, butter and cheese from dairy cows on family farms is, and should remain, an important feature of British agriculture. But if things continue as they are, traditional dairy farms will disappear from Britain. As we report today, the economy of milk production, especially on smaller farms, is unsustainable, and it is the relentless cost-cutting by some of the big supermarket chains that is responsible. As consumers, of course, we can benefit from their determination to pay the lowest price: we can buy a pint of milk for a couple of pence less. But the cumulative effect is to drive dairy farmers out of business - and that, in the long term, will be a loss for the British public. Some supermarkets - Tesco, Marks & Spencer, Sainsbury's and Waitrose - have agreed contracts with dairy farmers that allow them at least to recover the costs involved in producing milk. But those contracts cover only a small minority of British dairy farms, and even they do not leave farmers with any real profit. There are other supermarkets, however, that actually pay less for milk than it costs to produce. The Royal Association of British Dairy Farmers insists that all supermarkets could pay dairy farmers a price for milk that would meet the cost of production without increasing the price charged to the consumer: all they would need to do is to accept a slightly lower profit on the milk they sell. Sixteen years ago, according to the association, retailers made an average of 2.6p profit per litre. Now, they make nearly six times that amount. Even allowing for inflation, this is a serious jump in profit, and one which could surely be moderated without threatening the success of the supermarkets. Meanwhile, 20,000 dairy farms have disappeared over the same period. There are now only 14,500 left in Britain. Such rapid attrition must be halted, or the only dairy farms left will be the huge, agribusiness concerns on the American model - and that certainly would change Britain's countryside for the worse.