The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers Association (ICMSA) plans to meet the management of Ornua, the former Irish Dairy Board in the coming weeks to discuss the disclosure in Ornua’s Annual Report yesterday that its nine top executives shared more than €9m in combined pay, bonuses and pension contributions over the past two years, a period during which dairy farmers have been hit badly by falling prices due to lower global demand and expanded production.

ICMSA Deputy President, Pat McCormack says the pay disclosures couldn’t have come at a worse time and that he didn’t think farmers would "be able to relate to somebody on that kind of money" while the milk market struggles.

"The business seems to be going in the right direction but the timing of this announcements is the issue. There are farmers who are milking their cows every day and losing money every day in the context of falling milk prices and six weeks of bad weather," he continued.

Ornua is a co-operative, owned by the majority of the country’s dairy processing firms and ultimately by the country’s dairy farmers.