Digest highlights

• NMPF board advances FMMO proposal
• Appeals court rules ‘gruyere’ is generic term
• Lynn named Agri-Mark president and CEO
• GDT index, cheese price softens
• USDA offers risk management training funds
• Ag producer sentiment weakens

• February FMMO milk class prices back to 2021 levels
• Global dairy product prices declined in February
• Dairy margins ended February modestly higher
• RaboResearch: The dairy squeeze is on

In addition to state and regional dairy producers, organization leaders, processors and others, Progressive Dairy reached out to industry representatives with a broader view of the state of dairy entering 2023. Here are summaries of their comments.

Expanding on Progressive Dairy’s annual “State of Dairy” outlook for the northeast U.S., Zach Myers, risk education manager, and Jayne Sebright, executive director, provide insights on current conditions and future challenges and opportunities as 2023 gets underway.

Given its size, scope and geography, there are a range of issues facing the California dairy community. With attention spread across near-term financial challenges to longer-term environmental regulations, the state’s dairy producers are apprehensive at the start of 2023.

A numerical snapshot of Wisconsin shows the state averaged about 1.27 million dairy cows in 2022, producing almost 31.9 billion pounds of milk. Both changed little from the year before.

Dairy producers in Texas and New Mexico continue to be on different trajectories. Preliminary USDA data indicates Texas milk production grew by more than 925 million pounds (about 6%) in 2022, topping 16.5 billion pounds.

Geographically, the Central Federal Milk Marketing Order (FMMO) stretches across Oklahoma and Kansas, large portions of Colorado, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska, and into counties in Minnesota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Milk producers and handlers supplying the Appalachian Federal Milk Marketing Order (FMMO) cover five states: Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. Like their neighbors to the south, they share similar concerns and diverse outlooks.