Fear cheese factory will be shut down
Fear cheese factory will be shut down
By Robert Davies
Wales correspondent
WEST Wales milk producer Edwin Davies is spearheading a campaign to stop Dairy Crest buying the cheese factory he built and sold on to Milk Marque.
Mr Davies, of Ty Newydd, Brynog, one of two partners who built the Aeron Valley cheese factory on his farm in 1988, claims it would be a disaster if the company purchased the factory.
"Dairy Crests record in Wales is abysmal – they have closed plant after plant," says Mr Davies. He believes that despite the recent £2.2m investment at the plant, Aeron Valley will go the same way.
"My position is clear. I promise the hundreds of Welsh farmers who share my opinion that I will do everything I can to stop Dairy Crest signing up to buy the creamery on May 31."
This includes refusing to sign easements agreed with Milk Marque for materials like whey to be moved between the factory and other companies on the Felinfach site using pipes crossing his land.
Mr Davies remembers when Dairy Crest closed its original creamery in the Cardiganshire village, and he is convinced that after shutting plants at Whitland, Johnstown and Cardiff the company is determined to concentrate production at sites outside Wales.
On Monday farmers and councillors attended a meeting with Roger Evans, who is a Milk Marque residual board member and until recently farmed locally. He told them that former directors must get market value for all the co-ops assets, and return the money to members. He insisted that Dairy Crest could not be excluded from the bidding.
But Anglesey farmer Tom Jones, who is a Dairy Crest director, told farmers weekly that he thought producers, in what was one of the UKs most important milk production areas, were being "unduly pessimistic". *