U.S. dairy farmers have asked the USDA to purchase up to $150 million dollars’ worth of cheese. Pro Farmer’s First Thing Today says that money could purchase up to 90 million pounds of cheese to help feed the poor, and it also would help farmers struggling with the lowest milk prices they’ve seen since 2009. National Milk Producer’s Federation CEO Jim Mulhern said it would remove the equivalent of 900 million gallons of milk from the market. That move would boost global on farm income by 16 cents per hundredweight over one year, and improve dairy farmer income by $380 million dollars. Worldwide demand has slumped over the last two years, with a large part of that due to fewer purchases from China and Russia.
From the National Association of Farm Broadcasting news service.