The Federal Government has dedicated $140 million to dairy farmers in Australia, but it appears it is a little late for many Southern Highland dairy farmers.

The government initiative comes after the deregulation of the dairy industry in Australia.

The full figures were recently released to the dairy farmers of the region, and the compensation will be raised from consumers, and then passed on to the dairy farmers.

Avoca dairy farmer Noel Brumfield, sees the compensation claim as a little too late to soften the blow of deregulation.

“We’ve lost three large dairies recently, and there are now six less dairies in the Highlands since July last year,” Mr Brumfield said.

Mr Brumfield said that when he took over his father’s farm in 1997 there were about 48 dairies in the Southern Highlands and now there are less than 30.

“If those that got out of the dairy industry knew about the compensation package I believe that they would have hung on,” said Mr Brumfield.

``Before deregulation dairy farmers around the Highlands were averaging about 38 cents-a-litre for milk,’’ he said.

``Now farmers can expect between 26 and 30 cents-a-litre for the milk they produce.’’

The compensation payout will see a maximum of 12 cents-a-litre more than the current buying price depending on the particular farmers quota.

“When everyone heard this we all went home and started to calculate whether it was worth it or not,” Mr Brumfield said.

Mr Brumfield said that dairy cattle expenses had gone up in the last year, prices for heifers were now at $1500 and that fertiliser had nearly doubled from $390 a tonne last year to more than $500 due to the poor performance of the Australian dollar.

Production figures for the Southern Highlands have fallen by 17.88 per cent since the same time last year, which equates to about 16,000 litres a day less in milk production.

Mr Brumfield does not see this as exclusively a dairy problem.

Already one milk tanker truck driver has been made redundant due to the fall in dairy production in the last year.

“If all the dairies of the Southern Highlands disappear then the green of the rolling hills will disappear along with them,” said Mr Blumfield. A regional meeting discussing the restructure proposal will be held at the Mittagong RSL on Monday, commencing at 10.30am.