Butter Hillocks

A description of Europe’s stockpiles of unwanted dairy produce, which proved somewhat smaller than the “butter mountains” of the 1980s.

European dairy farmers have resorted to “milk strikes” and showy stunts,according to Leo Cendrowicz in Time. On September 21, more than 80,000 farmers across Europe poured away millions of liters of milk in an attempt to highlight the impact of low milk prices.

Cendrowicz reported:

European milk prices have plummeted 40% over the past six months, to around €0.25 ($0.36) per liter, less than the cost of production, according to Copa-Cogeca, a European farmers’ association. The group says the price collapse will cost dairy farmers about €10 billion ($14.6 billion) this year alone. …

The European Commission has moved in the short term to help farmers rebound from the global downturn. In January, milk prices fell so fast that officials reinstated export subsidies, a controversial measure that means European milk is sold to the rest of the world at artificially low prices, sometimes destroying local markets in poorer countries. In March, the commission started buying up butter and skimmed milk, raising the specter of new butter mountains†. (Officials said because the purchases were temporary and on such a small scale, they resulted only in what could be described as “butter hillocks.”)

(† The European Union has set milk quotas since the 1980s, when over-production resulted in vast “milk lakes” and “butter mountains” of unwanted produce. The quotas are to be phased out by 2015 – a move that Cendrowicz says most European dairy farmers oppose.)