Recently, traders and buyers in Estonia have been complaining about a shortage of butter. Why is this happening and could a similar situation happen in Latvia? The head of the Latvian Milk Processors Union, Janis Šolks, answered these questions in an interview with the Latvian Radio 4 program "Doma ploshad". This is reported by rus.lsm.lv. Our northern neighbors blame the shortage of butter on the excessively hot weather, which led to a decrease in the fat content of milk purchased from farmers. Another reason is the fact that milk producers have recently been chasing quantity, but have not paid enough attention to the quality of their products. A decrease in the fat content of milk is a trend of the last five years, which is noticeable not only in Estonia. A similar situation is observed in Latvia, although it is not so noticeable here yet. In Latvia, the drop in milk fat content was only one tenth of a percent – from 4 to 3.9. "Our situation is not critical, and this allows us to hope that there will be enough butter for everyone and the prices will not rise," the specialist assured. It is worth considering the fact that approximately half of all milk sold in Latvia and a third of other dairy products are imported. So the price is dictated not by Latvian producers, but by the general situation on the European market.
