THE NORTH’S largest dairy company, United Dairy Farmers, has reported improved profits for last year.

The company, parent of food-processing business Dale Farm, posted pretax profits of £4.4 million (€4.7 million) for the year to March 31st, 2009. Group turnover fell by 9 per cent to £333 million.

A strong consumer products performance in Dale Farm and falling costs offset both losses in commodity milk powder and a £1.25 million spend on providing support to alleviate low farmer milk prices in the last quarter of the financial year.

United’s group chief executive, David Dobbin, said the results had been delivered in challenging markets. “Having seen commodities lead the market up in 2007/2008, returns from commodity markets continued their steep decline in 2008/2009 with consumer products regaining their traditional premium in the marketplace.”