THE first milk tankers rolled into the new £45m United Milk dairy at Westbury on Friday.

Farmers from across the southwest, who have invested £11m in the plant, will be supplying the dairy, which has also created around 100 local jobs.

Milk volumes will build gradually and the plant expects an intake of 1.6 million litres per day by the middle of July and 2.4 million litres a day by October.

United Milk chairman, Richard Ashworth, said: "This is a milestone not just for United Milk but the entire UK industry.

"It is the culmination of years of planning and hard work.

"This sends the message that, despite the difficulties in the UK farming industry, United Milk farmers have been prepared to back their judgment and take the future into their own hands."

A number of major UK milk co-operatives as well as several private and co-operative dairy companies have submitted tenders to the plant to supply milk.

United Milk chief executive, Don Morris, said: "We are delighted with the response to the Westbury tender.

"It demonstrates that a number of key players in the UK milk industry agree with us that there is much to be gained by working together. The offers to supply following the tender mean that, including our direct supply farms, we are assured of the milk we need to build capacity through the commissioning phase up to the autumn."

Work began on the state-of-the-art farmer-owned processing plant in January.

The plant is the biggest of its type in the country and has the capacity to produce up to 40,000 tonnes of butter and 75,000 tonnes of skimmed milk each year.

It will process 800 million litres of milk per year 5.5 per cent of the UK milk quota into skimmed milk powder, butter and cream.

Following a visit to the plant, National Farmers Union president, Ben Gill said: "This is exactly the kind of initiative that

the NFU has been saying dairy farmers must become involved with if they are to earn a fairer share of the market price."