The largest losses this year were in central Minnesota’s dairy heartland. Stearns and Morrison counties saw 27 and 21 fewer permits in December than in January, respectively.
Counties in southeastern Minnesota’s dairy belt — Fillmore (nine), Goodhue (six) and Houston (five) — also saw significant losses. A few counties in Minnesota saw small increases in the number of dairy permits, including Becker (two) and Aitkin, Winona and Swift (one).
The bitter news follows a year of bottoming-out commodity prices on milk and cheese. The U.S. also lost, on appeal, a challenge to Canada’s dairy program before an international arbitration board that would’ve opened up a new market for Minnesota dairy manufacturers and farmers.
Last month, a dispute settlement panel under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), the replacement to NAFTA, ruled 2 to 1 in favor of Canada’s milk program, which curtails imports through a tariff quota system and is largely viewed as protectionist.
“It’s a market that should be there, but it isn’t,” said Alan Bjerga, a spokesman for the National Milk Producers Federation, which represents many of the nation’s dairy cooperatives. “It’s safe to say U.S. dairy producers did not get the quota that they thought they were promised under USMCA.”
The news wasn’t all dour for dairy. The downward trend in fluid milk consumption over the last year was outpaced by faster declines in dairy alternatives such as oat milk. Meanwhile, before leaving for the holidays, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to return whole milk to American schools.
