U.S. farmers received about 17.4 cents for every $1 spent by consumers at the retail level. Dairy margins held relatively steady over the last half of August. California's October 2016 Class 1 minimum milk prices slipped from a month earlier, but remain higher than a year ago.

Dairy organizations in the U.S., Australia, the European Union, Mexico and New Zealand issued a joint letter to their respective trade and agriculture officials, urging them to challenge Canada’s dairy policies as protectionist.

Lawyers representing the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) and major dairy cooperatives ended five years of litigation surrounding the “herd retirement” component of the Cooperatives Working Together (CWT), agreeing to settle the lawsuit for $52 million.

U.S. dairy cattle exports remained slow in July, but with global dairy prices beginning to show signs of modest recovery, interest – if not actual sales – is providing a glimmer of hopefulness.

Overall U.S. dairy product export performance in July was in line with recent months, according to Alan Levitt, with the U.S. Dairy Export Council.

Two U.S. lawmakers representing major U.S. dairy states, U.S. Sens. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), have called on Obama Administration leaders to review new Canadian trade policies they say will hurt the U.S. dairy industry.

U.S. hay growers are entering the final four months of 2016 facing economic conditions shared by many other agricultural commodity producers: Higher production levels are adding to supplies at a time when global economies are still on the slow road to recovery, putting pressure on producer prices and income.

The U.S. average all-milk price rose $1.30 per hundredweight (cwt) in July, equalling the 2016 high set in January, according to the USDA NASS Ag Prices report, released Aug. 31.

Dairy producers enrolled in the Margin Protection Program for Dairy (MPP-Dairy) will have to wait another month to get the second half of the July-August pay period calculations. However, the July milk-income-over-feed-cost margin jumped more than $1.80 per hundredweight (cwt) from the May-June average, all but assuring any indemnity payment will be minimal, at best.

Despite current futures prices pointing to improved dairy producer income margins, it’s advisable to build a price floor using available risk management tools, according to Alan Zepp, risk management program manager at Pennsylvania's Center for Dairy Excellence (CDE).