Agrifood Sector Studies Poland: The Dairy sector in Poland

By Jerzy Wilkin, Dominika Milczarek, Agata Malak-Rawlikowska, Jan Fałkowski

Summary

The general research questions covered in this report are: (1) What is the nature of the restructuring of the food industry? (2) What are farmers' marketing channel choices? (3) What are the practices / behaviours related to farmers' marketing channel choices? (4) What is the impact of these practices / behaviours on factor markets?

Policy recommendations

The following preliminary policy recommendations can be made:

•· Various scenarios need to be prepared to cover the situation of the dairy sector from the perspective of more open and liberal markets. Polish dairy market actors should be more active at the EU level in promoting the interests of Polish producers and processors. Different forms of cooperation, both within and between different food-chain segments, should be supported.

•· There is a strong need to develop non-agricultural income sources in rural areas in order to encourage and enable less efficient farmers to quit milk production.

•· There is a strong need to strengthen rural development measures, especially concerning the production and promotion of niche and regional products, as well as cooperation between farmers.

•· Lack of funds is one of the most important barriers to development at farm level, so financial education should be promoted among farmers.

•· The reorganization of the milk-quota distribution in the country should be considered, because the current system negatively influences the performance of both milk producers and processors.