It’s become a tradition for the Progressive Dairyman team to scope out new products, ideas and innovations to share with readers following World Dairy Expo in Madison, Wisconsin. The 2017 show, with a theme of “Discovering New Dairy Worlds,” had plenty to offer.

With increasing U.S. milk production outpacing growth in domestic consumption, the global market will become more important as an outlet for U.S. sales. U.S. dairy marketing leaders outlined efforts to boost U.S. dairy product exports during a press conference at World Dairy Expo, Oct. 4, in Madison, Wisconsin.

We’re into the fourth quarter of 2017. Looking back to late summer, August might have provided the high point for prices and margins.

Digest Highlights: MPP-Dairy has late-filing provision. McCarty, VanTilburg families form Ohio dairy partnership. NMPF targets dairy imitation products. Despite hurricane damage, cottonseed supplies should be ample. Find a summary of these stories and updates on previous Progressive Dairyman news stories here.

Taking risks out of federal milk marketing order (FMMO) Class I (fluid) milk marketing could benefit processors and farmers, and stem the tide of declining fluid milk sales, according to John Newton, Market Intelligence director with the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF).

We wax poetic about dairy farming – it’s among the most iconic images of life in North America. But let’s not kid ourselves: it is a business. Complex. Unlike other businesses, it’s a 24-hour-a-day exercise in precision and intelligence. Technology solutions have become commonplace to help identify and control those variables, but the “intelligence” from these solutions is often not able to drive a corresponding reaction until hours or days later. And the person collecting the data often has to interpret the data on their own by comparing numerous different spreadsheets.

Elanco Animal Health is ”exploring strategic options” for Posilac, including seeking a buyer for the recombinant bovine somatotropin (rBST) molecule and its manufacturing facility located in Augusta, Georgia.

For more than a century, on behalf of dairy farmers and the dairy community, the National Dairy Council (NDC) has been committed to nutrition research and education. It has supported groundbreaking scientific research, including E.V. McCollum’s, who first made the scientific connection between dairy foods and good health in 1917.

Your local dairy promotion organizations also develop important partnerships that advance dairy farmers’ interests and help consumers live healthier lives:

Back where it all began, the 2017 North American Manure Expo was held Aug. 22-23 at the University of Wisconsin Agricultural Research Station in Arlington, Wisconsin.