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Dairy markets expected to stay the course

An ag economist says dairy markets aren’t expected to change much next year.

Chris Wolf with Michigan State University tells Brownfield while crop prices are expected to remain low next year, overall dairy markets aren’t too exciting either.  “Contingent on what happens with feed prices and international trade, any kind of weather events which we have no way of really forecasting for the next year—but at the current time 2018 looks a lot like 2017.”

He says processing capacity in Michigan is full, and higher marketing and transportation costs along with sometimes distressed sales and dumped milk has meant dairy farmers are receiving even lower milk prices than others in surrounding states.  “Michigan mailbox prices have been lower, a dollar a hundredweight or more lower, for the last couple years lower than what we would historically expect them to be in relation to the prices like the U.S. all milk price and the price in states surrounding Michigan.”

Wolf says for some farmers in Michigan, the growing pains experienced by the industry have been fatal for their business which has meant they might have decided to retire a little earlier than they had planned on in order to preserve equity, or have even sold out instead of expanding to bring on another generation back to the farm.

AUDIO: Interview with Chris Wolf