Australian Dairy Farmers and DA get their election promise money but are tight lipped about how it will be spent

The money was heralded by agriculture minister Bridget McKenzie as following through with election commitments.

In a May announcement, the Liberal Party had laid out a funding breakdown:

Last week, Ms McKenzie said the grant to Australian Dairy Farmers of $1.01 million would be used for "projects to support a more transparent and accountable dairy sector.".

"The grant will develop a standard contract that will fit with the industry's mandatory code of conduct, making it easier for farmers to deal with processors.

"It will explore the design, development and market testing for a new milk pricing and trading platform, which could potentially give dairy farmers more selling options.

"And it will explore the development of a payment system using blockchain technology to enable quicker and more transparent, secure payments to dairy farmers by processors.

"We're currently consulting on what a milk marketing and trading platform might look like as part of the development of the mandatory Dairy Code of Conduct.

"The grant for Dairy Australia of $500,000 will help dairy farmers through the development and roll out or (sic) practical materials for farmers to build financial and legal literacy and risk planning.

"Dairy Australia will also develop business tools to help farmers better understand their production costs and milk prices in their region.

"This will give them more information for when they enter into contract and payment arrangements, to make sure those arrangements best suit their business."

But DA chief executive David Nation was reluctant to elaborate on the projects it would deliver to dairy farmers.

"We're in discussions with both the ADF and the ADPF about how, once the code is in place, that milk prices will be made public and, once they're made public, how we can help farmers with understanding implications of different pricing," Dr Nation said.

"There is an overlap going on with the code coming into place and us making clear commitments in the Dairy Plan, which will be launched in a couple of weeks.

"There will be more detail in that launch of how we as an industry have been discussing how to increase trust and transparency along the supply chain, particularly between farmers and processors.

"It's premature and not necessarily my news to talk about some of the really good ideas that other parties are talking about in this space."

Other measures include $10 million in grants to help dairy farmers upgrade or invest in energy efficient equipment to reduce energy costs, an extra $8.1 million for the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's Agriculture Unit to establish a dairy specialist position and ensure compliance with a mandatory dairy code, and $3 million to support farmers set up cooperatives and other collective business models.

Australian Dairy Farmers did not respond to requests to discuss the grants.