Weak first-quarter 2018 milk prices applied downward pressure on prices paid for dairy replacement cows, but foreign demand for U.S. dairy heifers remains strong.

Digest Highlights: From a price formula change proposal and EU-Mexico trade agreement restrictions to school milk and FDA labeling oversight, find a summary of news affecting dairy farmers here.

Editor’s note:  Estimated monthly MPP-Dairy indemnity payments have been adjusted from the original article to account for federal budget sequestration deductions.  Dairy farmers who enroll in the 2018 Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy) and elect $7, $7.50 or $8 per hundredweight (cwt) margin coverage are guaranteed indemnity payments for February and March. And, based on the two-month indemnity payment estimates, producers who can stick to Tier I premium payments at the $8 margin level will cover full-year program costs in February-March alone.

Although the spring flush is moving north and regional milk processing capacity is again becoming a challenge, the number of U.S. plants manufacturing one or more dairy products (excluding fluid milk) is actually at a two-decade high.

While the Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy) has been getting most of the publicity, the recent improvement in milk futures prices is pulling the Livestock Gross Margin for Dairy (LGM-Dairy) program back into risk management strategies for larger producers.

Digest Highlights: Wisconsin snowstorm losses mount. California FMMO timeline summarized. AMPI sets news cheese output record. Several processors plan expansions. Find a summary of this and other news here.

Milk production quota in five eastern Canadian provinces will be rolled back effective May 1 over fears of rising butter stocks.

Rabobank’s Dairy Quarterly Q1 Report provides a current snapshot of seven major dairy regions of the world, as well as things to watch for in the second and third quarters of 2018.

Some dairy producers could see total 2018 Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy) premium payments recouped within two months.

U.S. milk production posted a more modest 1.3 percent year-over-year increase in March, but the subplot in the story was the USDA’s reduction in cow numbers and milk production retroactively to the start of the year.