Industry News

With a fair amount of fanfare and promotion to overcome negative experiences related to its predecessor, a new “dairy safety net” was launched in 2019. Approved in the 2018 Farm Bill and based on adjustments made early in 2018 under a federal budget bill, the Dairy Margin Coverage program (DMC) replaced the expired Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy).

For U.S. dairy farmers, 2019 was dominated by two things many probably wished they had a little more control over: the weather and the government.

You’re busy milking cows and meeting with your lender to review year-end financials. With that in mind, Progressive Dairy looks at issues in the news impacting you and your dairy business.

Digest Highlights

• Thanksgiving meal: Digest the economics
• December Class I base a five-year high
• Dairy margins start November stronger
• October 2019 dairy cow slaughter jumps
• Farm wages on the rise
• USDA buys UHT, evaporated milk, string cheese
• USDA dairy trade outlook shows small improvement

The EPA is making $4.8 million available to expand research into per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination in agriculture and rural areas. EPA Regional Administrator Ken McQueen announced the funding at the 2019 annual meeting of the New Mexico Farm & Livestock Bureau, Nov. 22.

A loophole in the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP) is especially costly to Northeast dairy farmers raising dairy replacement heifers organically, according to Fay Benson, project manager with the New York Organic Dairy Program.