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Total milk production for the US reached 8.19m tonnes in June. This is a rise of nearly 1.6% on the same month last year. Collections for the month also exceeded the three-year average for June by 2.93% and five-year average for the month by 4.67%.
Cumulative US collections for the first half of 2017 now total 49.39m tonnes, up 1.44% on the 48.68m tonnes a year earlier.
A number of factors have led to this increase, with the national herd expanding from a milking herd of 8.65m cows in 2016, for the 23 major milk-producing states, to 8.73m cows in June 2017.
At the same time, there has been an increased milk production per cow in these 23 states. This has increased from 1,906 pounds to 1,919 pounds for June 2017.
Milk collections for the two biggest milk-producing states California and Idaho were down by 2.9% and 1.5% respectively, with dryness in California, the biggest milk producer in the US, affecting their collections in June. A sharp increase in milk collected in Texas, where production increased by 16% year-on-year, offset the reductions in California and Idaho.
Exports on the rise
With production on the rise, US dairy exports are also increasing. For May 2017, dairy exports from the US had increased by 34% compared with May 2016 to reach $509m (€447.9m).
Exporters shipped 169,648t of milk powder, cheese, butterfat, whey and lactose, up by 15% from last May. Mexico was the single-biggest market for dairy produce, with almost 30% of US dairy exports going there in May.
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