Researchers have found that organic milk generally contained less saturated fat and more good fatty acids than milk produced at intensive commercial dairy farms.

Its health giving properties were also much less likely to be affected by changes in the weather.

Scientists at the University of Newcastle found non-organic milk collected during a particularly poor UK summer and the following winter had significantly higher saturated fat content and far less beneficial fatty acids than in a more “normal” year.

But they also discovered that switching to organic milk could help overcome these problems.

Organic supermarket milk showed higher levels of nutritionally beneficial fatty acids compared with “ordinary” milk regardless of the time of year or weather conditions.

Gillian Butler, who led the study, puts the differences down to a lower reliance on grazing and fertiliser suppressing clover on conventional farms.

“The results suggest greater uniformity of feeding practice on farms supplying organic milk since there were no brands which differed consistently in fat composition,” she said.