Dairy Business

It's a life of high risk, and high reward. Dairy farmers face their share of challenges, including a volatile market and unpredictable input costs — however, there are young people looking for ways to get into the business.

Andy Birch for instance is a 30-year-old dairyman and owner of the Maple Grove Farm. He offers this advice for his fellow young, dairy producers.

"I would tell them not to rush into it don't be afraid of working for someone else for a few years you have your entire life ahead of you and just taking that pause between college and going into business on your own can be really valuable as far as the lessons you can learn working for other people."

Birsh also says he got some help along the way in starting up... and credits the Holstein Association USA with helping him get a foothold in the dairy industry, starting as a junior member.

"They've helped me build value into my cattle and even to find good cows to get started with I think from the beginning helped me to have a strong start."

Dairy farmers might get more help soon from technology improvements with a "virtual dairy farm brain" that will collect and integrate all of a farm's data streams in real time and then use artificial intelligence to analyze it to help farmers make better management decisions.