Sue McCloskey and her husband, Mike, run Fair Oaks Farms, a 37,000-cow operation and agritourist park in Indiana. The farm and its cooperative, Select Milk Producers, is working in partnership with Coca-Cola to produce the milk-based product FairLife.

During the year, CWT received 1,285 requests for assistance. CWT provided member cooperatives with assistance on 582 resulting in 102.5 million pounds of Cheddar, Gouda and Monterey Jack cheese, 53.8 million pounds of 82% milkfat content butter and 34.7 million pounds of Whole Milk Powder being sold by CWT member cooperatives.

A comprehensive new resource on feed and animal management is now available for farmers, veterinarians, nutritionists, dairy science educators and other farm experts and advisers. Considerations & Resources on Feed and Animal Management is the first report to consolidate and synthesize practical information on animal and feed management that improves productivity and profitability while reducing enteric emissions.

Dairy owners and managers from around the country learned about how to improve their hiring practices and build better teams at the most recent PDPW Managers Academy held in Charlotte, North Carolina. More than 80 dairy professionals from 17 states participated in the three-day training.

More than 550 farmers, nutritionists and industry partners recently attended the invitation-only 2015 Leading Producers Conference, Jan. 6-7 in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, to address everyday challenges that have a huge impact on today’s diverse dairy farms.

Fluid milk sales continue to be a challenge. Per-capita consumption of fluid milk today is only about two-thirds what it was back in 1970. There has been little good news to report about fluid milk. Fortunately, there is now encouraging news. Some major dairy companies and cooperatives are stepping out, making a financial investment and seeking new opportunities for fluid milk. These new opportunities include processing, packaging and marketing milk with more protein or extended shelf life.