{"id":69810,"date":"2026-08-11T23:27:16","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T23:27:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/69810\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T23:27:16","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T23:27:16","slug":"queensland-dairy-farmer-fears-closure-after-processor-ends-milk-supply-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/69810\/","title":{"rendered":"Queensland dairy farmer fears closure after processor ends milk supply contract"},"content":{"rendered":"

A devastated Queensland dairy farmer fears he will be forced to cull his prized herd of 600 Brown Swiss cows if he can’t find a processor to buy his milk.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year Jason Rozynski’s family celebrated 80 years of dairying on their home farm but now fear it could be their last.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Jason Rozynski has worked to build up his Brown Swiss dairy herd. (Supplied: Payton Rozynski)<\/p>\n

Independent processor Maleny Dairies informed Mr Rozynski in June his contract to supply milk would not be renewed.<\/p>\n

“On Friday, we’ll be four weeks from not having anywhere to send our milk,” Mr Rozynski said.<\/p>\n

“We \u2026 are absolutely shocked to think that we could be in a situation where we have to meatworks (slaughter) those cows and close down.”<\/p>\n

Maleny Dairies co-owner Ross Hopper said it was a “business decision” to end the decade-long supply relationship.<\/p>\n

“It’s not our intention to be mongrels,” Mr Hopper said.<\/p>\n

“It’s just business, and we don’t want to go down in a heap; otherwise, there’d be more farmers disrupted.”<\/p>\n

\"Dairy<\/p>\n

The Rozynskis began developing their Brown Swiss herd 20 years ago. (Supplied: Payton Rozynski)<\/p>\n

It comes just six months after farmers, processors and the state government launched the 2026-2032 Queensland Dairy Plan, which aimed to lift the volume of milk produced in the state by five per cent.<\/p>\n

As cheaper southern milk pours over the border, industry representatives say without stable processing capacity, any effort to increase production will turn sour.<\/p>\n

Nowhere to go<\/p>\n

The Rozynski family produces about 3.3 million litres of milk from two farms near Imbil in the Mary Valley, about 170 kilometres north of Brisbane.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Lisa Rozynski is proud of her daughter Payton, who plans to study veterinary science. (ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols)<\/p>\n

As his 17-year-old daughter Payton competed in the dairy judging competition at the Ekka, Mr Rozynski contemplated the farm’s future.<\/p>\n

“We’re so involved in the dairy industry and I’ve always been positive and proactive with it,” Mr Rozynski said.<\/p>\n

“You just wonder how on earth we could end up in this situation.”Farmers return to Qld dairy industry<\/a><\/p>\n

After decades of dramatic decline, the number of dairy farms in Queensland has stabilised, and the industry is starting to rebuild.<\/p>\n

He said the family was “extremely hurt” by Maleny Dairies’ decision, but at first they were confident they could find a new processor.<\/p>\n

“Normally that wouldn’t be a problem,” Mr Rozynski said.<\/p>\n

“You’d ring around some other processors and get pricings and pick which one best suited to your farm.<\/p>\n

“We did that \u2026 and everybody said their books are closed and there’s no room.”\"A<\/p>\n

Angus, 15, (pictured with Lisa, Payton and Jason) hopes to be the fourth generation of the Rozynski family in the dairy industry. (ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols)<\/p>\n

The Rozynski’s were featured at the launch of the new Dairy Plan in February, which processors Norco, Bega Cheese, Lactalis Australia, and Dairy Farmers all signed up to.<\/p>\n

None have agreed to buy the Rozynski’s milk.<\/p>\n

“It’s just mind blowing to think that we do a really good job with our milk, high quality, great animal welfare \u2026 and we can’t find a home for our milk,” he said.<\/p>\n

\"Ross<\/p>\n

Ross Hopper in front of a new robot in the cold room at Maleny Dairies, November 2019. (ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols)<\/p>\n

Maleny Dairies purchases milk from 11 farms in south-east Queensland, employs more than 50 workers at their processing plant, and has invested millions of dollars in efficiencies, including robotics.<\/p>\n

Mr Hopper said currently there was an oversupply of milk in the state.<\/p>\n

“This year we’ve got too much milk,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We’ve had to reduce our oversupply \u2014 it’s just economics.”<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

A robot at work in the cold room at Maleny Dairies, November 2019. (ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols)<\/p>\n

About half of the milk Queenslanders consume, an estimated 250-300 million litres a year, comes from interstate.<\/p>\n

Mr Hopper said Maleny Dairies, like other processors, had purchased milk from interstate \u2014 but only when local supply was low.<\/p>\n

“When things aren’t lining up \u2026 we’ve got to adjust our contracts to suit and adjust our milk flow and volumes,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We didn’t think that finding another processor (for the Rozynskis) would be that hard.”<\/p>\n

He said in the past the company sent excess milk to another processor at a loss, but that arrangement had ended.<\/p>\n

Over and under supply<\/p>\n

Dairy farmer Tim Bale advocates for the industry in NSW and Qld as the president of EastAUSmilk.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

NSW dairy farmer Tim Bale was elected president of EastAusMilk in 2026. (ABC Rural: Jennifer Nichols)<\/p>\n

He said several factors, including the sale of Lactalis’s historic South Brisbane factory in July for redevelopment, were affecting processing capacity.<\/p>\n

“Some of Norco’s milk was going through there,” Mr Bale said.<\/p>\n

“Now Norco has a greater volume of milk they’ve got to deal with, and they’ve got issues there just dealing with their excess.”Historic South Brisbane milk factory to close<\/a><\/p>\n

Queensland’s largest and oldest milk processing plant will close in South Brisbane in July, opening development opportunities for the valuable riverfront site.<\/p>\n

Mr Bale said Woolworths’ decision to phase out its Farmers Own brand, which buys direct from three farms in Qld and five in NSW, had “added to the chaos” as those farmers also sought to find a new home for their milk.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson from Woolworths said it was consulting those farmers about the upcoming contract expiry.<\/p>\n

“We are working closely with our suppliers and will continue to honour our contract terms, which includes an option for farmers to extend the contract for an extra 12 months,” she said.<\/p>\n

Norco and Lactalis were also contacted for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A devastated Queensland dairy farmer fears he will be forced to cull his prized herd of 600 Brown…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":69811,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[7116,22,21,94147,21986,10124,94148,30,36115,1076],"class_list":["post-69810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-agriculture","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-dairy","tag-farm","tag-farmer","tag-maleny","tag-milk","tag-price","tag-sunshine-coast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69810"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69810\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}