Dairy

2023 was a roller coaster for dairy. What about 2024? 2023 was a roller coaster year for many in agriculture, especially those in the dairy industry, and a new year brings new expectations. Zach Bowers with Ever AG reflects on the ups and downs of 2023. Looking back. Speaker2: On it, I never in a million years would have guessed we would have seen the $14 class three that we did in that June July period, and then to follow it up with $19 just a couple months later and then right back down where we're at, you're looking at 1530 ish class three at the moment for January in. Speaker1: 2024, Bowers says the supply will dictate the direction of markets to. Speaker2: Supply. Side continues to do its thing. Here we're seeing cow numbers drop. We're seeing that milk production report continue to run lower, not only here but actually globally Europe trending lower same time as they're affected by poor margins and environmental regulations similar to us here in the US, but actually a little bit more extreme looking into 2024. Supply side probably continues to stay tight and eventually that will catch up to us. And I think we'll allow for better milk prices. The time being though, the next 3 to 6 months. Hard to get really excited about this market. Speaker1: Bowers says that we should look deeper into the cheese production side of the industry. Speaker2: The last couple of years, all we've done is add more cheese production. These new billion dollar cheese plants to run efficiently have to always run full. So even with milk production tightening, that usually just ends up shorting the class four butter powder plants. That continues to hold the 19 plus dollar milk price in the 2024. Speaker1: Fingers crossed.