Drought drags Australian production down

AUSTRALIA – Drought conditions in Australia’s dairy farming regions have been blamed for production figures in the 2002/2003 season being 8.4% down on the previous year.

Drought conditions in key dairy farming regions resulted in Australian milk production for the 2002/03 year being down 8.4% over 2001/02, according to annual production statistics released by Dairy Australia.

A total of 10.32 billion litres were produced in Australia compared with 11.27 billion in the previous fiscal year. The two worst affected states were Tasmania and Victoria where production fell 12.8% and 11.1% respectively. Tasmania produced 5.7% of the nation’s milk while Victoria produced 63.8%. Production in the second largest dairy production state, New South Wales fell by 3.1%, while in Queensland it fell by 3.4%.

Dairy Australia replaced the Australian Dairy Corporation and the Dairy Research and Development Corporation in July of this year. It assumed the existing functions of ADC and DRDC other than the export control functions, which returned to Government