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NMPF Statement on the Bulk Infant Formula to Retail Shelves Act

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

From NMPF President and CEO Jim Mulhern:

“NMPF has not opposed the temporary, short-term lifting of restrictions on infant formula imports to address the rare formula availability crisis and did not oppose the just-passed Bulk Infant Formula to Retail Shelves Act given its targeted volume and limited time frame. Those guardrails are necessary to ensure that imports temporarily complement U.S. supplies rather than displace existing available dairy formula ingredients.

“NMPF emphatically opposes efforts that would create long-term dependence on foreign suppliers for a critical nutritional food. The focus must be to develop additional production in the United States necessary to ensure that this crisis isn’t repeated. As the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us, only a robust domestic supply chain, with American workers and U.S. sources of production, can best protect families against potentially tragic disruptions of critically needed products.

“NMPF also opposes giving foreign companies regulatory advantages that domestic producers don’t have. Overseas milk production that doesn’t meet the same stringent regulations met by our own producers shouldn’t be allowed into the United States under any but the most extreme circumstances, such as the immediate shortfalls that we see now but expect will soon be alleviated by domestic supplies resuming their typical production levels.

“The most meaningful step the U.S. government can take to shore up domestic formula supplies would be to analyze what policy and regulatory reforms are needed to enable the U.S. to expand infant formula production in this country to ensure ample supplies for the domestic market as well as to become a net exporter of infant formula. That retains the strongest degree of domestic control – and thus security — over needed supplies of this critical, life-saving product.”

NMPF’s Bjerga on Butter and Cheese

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga discusses the steady rise of butter and cheese consumption over the past decade on RFD-TV. With per-capita U.S. dairy consumption hovering at six-decade highs, butter and cheese have been key drivers of dairy demand. But watch out for sour cream and yogurt when new USDA data comes out Friday, he said.

NMPF Statement on White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Jim Mulhern, president and CEO of the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF), issued the following statement regarding today’s White House Conference on Hunger Nutrition and Health:

“I would like to thank the White House for inviting me to today’s White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. Ensuring people have access to the nutrition they need to live, develop, and be healthy is key priority for dairy farmers across the U.S. We are hopeful today will serve as a launching pad for the dedication and collaboration we will need to end food insecurity and reduce diet-related disease in the U.S., goals NMPF shares with the conference.

“We know from decades of working in this area that dairy products — and the 13 essential nutrients they provide such as protein, calcium, Vitamin D and potassium — will be vital ingredients to meeting these goals. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) shows that dietary patterns that include dairy are associated with beneficial health outcomes, such as lowered risk for cardiovascular disease, obesity, and type 2 diabetes. The guidelines also note that dairy is under-consumed across all age categories. Scientific evidence clearly indicates that milk and dairy foods are part of the solution to challenges like food and nutrition insecurity, health equity, and diet-related and other noncommunicable diseases.

“To prepare for the conference, NMPF worked with other agricultural, anti-hunger, nutrition and medical groups to urge the White House to place a high priority on access to affordable, diverse and healthful foods, which includes protecting Americans’ ability to make informed, meaningful choices about what they eat. NMPF is pleased to see in the White House’s strategy released yesterday a commitment to increased access to affordable food for all and culturally appropriate food options and recommendations. We are also heartened by the strategy’s consistent emphasis on increasing consumption of healthful foods to levels recommended in the dietary guidelines.

NMPF looks forward to continuing to work with all stakeholders inside and outside government to improve nutrition security and diet-related health for all Americans. Together we can realize the policies and programs required to achieve these important goals, including increasing access to affordable food and strengthening Americans’ ability to make informed, meaningful choices across all populations.”

Butter and Cheese Keep Dairy’s Rise Constant

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

While we won’t know until Friday whether U.S. per-capita dairy consumption will officially rise for the seventh time in eight years, we do know from preliminary data that domestic use of butter and cheese reached records in 2021. Then again, that’s far from a surprise.

  

Though other dairy products have had their ups and downs (mostly up), for the past decade butter and cheese have been Old Reliables, with neither ever seeing consumption decline a single time. Their rising popularity has offset drops in fluid-milk consumption (the typical, and inaccurate, trope that anti-dairy activists use to pronounce “death” upon the industry) and is a big part of the industry’s continued success and bright future.

Dairy, as an industry, is in constant evolution, from advances in science to innovations in sustainability. But throughout, “bring on the butter” and “more cheese, please” have been continual refrains.  The data shows it, and there’s no reason think those words won’t echo for years to come.

NMPF’s Bjerga on the Myths of Plant-Based Beverages (Parts 1 & 2)

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

In a two-part interview with Ag Information of the West, NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga takes on the myths perpetuated by plant-based beverage marketers in the context of such beverages’ declining sales.  “If you read some of this media coverage in the last few years, you would have thought that cows were on their way to going extinct,” Bjerga said. “I think the cows are alive and well.” Part 1 is here, part 2 is here.

NMPF’s Galen Discusses USDA Investment in Climate-Start Agriculture

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Chris Galen, senior vice president of membership services and strategic initiatives, discusses USDA’s recent announcement to support dairy farmers nationwide through its Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities.

Say It Loud, Say It Clear: The Plant-Based Beverage Bust is Here

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

It was the fundamental fallacy that launched a thousand news articles: Dairy was dying as consumers were switching to plant-based beverages. That was always a lie — but at least from a certain angle, it could be stretched into something that at least somewhat looked it like could be true. After all, U.S. fluid milk consumption (though not dairy overall, a fact that was conveniently ignored) has declined, and plant-based beverage sales were rising.

But now even that distortion is no longer true. Retail sales volume of plant-based beverages year-over-year have been negative since February, continuing a trend of flat-to-declining volume that dates to mid-2021. This is no longer a blip – it’s a reality, an inconvenient truth that we hope may finally put the original lie to rest.

Declining sales are only some of the woes Team Plant-Based is facing. While eating your fruits and veggies remains good advice – and always will be – that doesn’t mean that ditching dairy nutrients, or animal protein and nutrition in general, is a good idea. The environmental claims of alternatives can be wildly overstated. The nutrition benefits often remain doubtful. And once the novelty wears off, imitator inferiority is left to shine through.

Maybe that’s why Oatly’s share price has declined more than 80 percent since going public last year. Maybe that’s why Beyond Meat is struggling, and the CEO of Maple Leaf Foods said the alts market is unlikely to pan out as originally thought.

And maybe it’s another reason why the Food and Drug Administration shouldn’t reward bad-faith arguments from desperate plant-based promoters that consumer acceptance of their heavily processed, sweetened water as “milk” is inevitable, and they should be rewarded for insisting on misusing a term they have no right to use under existing federal regulation.

If nothing else, perhaps declining sales would inject some welcome humility into marketing claims. Of course, we live in the real world, making that outcome, however desirable, highly doubtful.

But at the very least, the news of declining plant-based beverage sales should be reported just as forcefully as the distortion that was used to malign an entire industry. After being told for years that plant-based beverages were the wave of the future, the public would be well-served to know that the hype was a mirage.

United States to Host 2023 IDF World Dairy Summit in Chicago

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

The United States will host the International Dairy Federation (IDF) World Dairy Summit, the world’s biggest dairy conference, in October 2023 at Chicago’s famed McCormick Place conference center, IDF and the U.S. National Committee of the IDF (US-IDF) announced today. The honor provides an opportunity to showcase the dairy sector’s innovations in sustainability, nutrition and health, standards, safety and quality, to accomplish its purpose of nourishing the world with safe, nutritious and sustainable foods.

The IDF World Dairy Summit, the world’s leading international gathering of dairy-industry professionals, provides a vital forum for dairy leaders, experts, farmers, processors, traders and journalists worldwide to discuss how to further advance the collective global dairy sector forward in a positive, sustainable way. The meeting being organized by US-IDF, held in the United States for the first time since 1993, and IDF Head Office, offers a global opportunity for attendees to bring their perspective to discussions on how the sector can deliver impact now and into the future. That reflects the theme of the IDF World Dairy Summit 2023: “BE Dairy –Boundless Potential. Endless Possibilities.”

“As host, U.S. dairy is developing programming that will feature global and industry leaders, experts, scientists, technical specialists, farmers and more, exploring the global dairy sector’s most significant opportunities today and tomorrow,” shares US-IDF Organizing Committee Co-chair Nick Gardner, Senior Vice President of Sustainability and Multilateral Affairs with the U.S. Dairy Export Council (USDEC). “At the same time, the beautiful host city of Chicago offers the best of American food, arts, music, and culture, all in close proximity to some of America’s famed dairy regions,” he added.

“The U.S. is excited to showcase the diversity of our dairy industry and its allied sectors,” adds US-IDF Organizing Committee Co-chair Shawna Morris, Senior Vice President of Trade Policy for the National Milk Producers Federation and USDEC. “Today, 94% of U.S. dairy farms are family farms. They span an astonishing variety of sizes and sustainability practices. The U.S. dairy processing sector is no less diverse — from specialty cheesemakers to cutting edge dairy ingredient and cheese manufacturing facilities. Our industry has come together collectively to play a leadership role on sustainability, trade, and dairy nutrition initiatives. We look forward to engaging with the global dairy sector on those and other topics as we work together to collectively reinforce the vital role dairy plays in communities around the world.”

“The IDF World Dairy Summit in Chicago will bring the whole dairy sector to gain and exchange knowledge, promote innovation and create networking and business opportunities. It will also coincide with the 120th anniversary of IDF, an occasion for showing the world all the expertise gain throughout the years and the potential of IDF and its programme of work for the benefit of future generations”, concludes IDF Director General, Ms. Caroline Emond.

For more information about the 2023 IDF World Dairy Summit, visit www.idfwds2023.com. For more information about IDF, visit www.fil-idf.org. For more information about US-IDF, visit www.usidf.org.

NMPF Statement on USDA Support for Dairy in Climate-Smart Commodities Projects

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

From NMPF President and CEO Jim Mulhern:

“America’s dairy community applauds USDA’s support for the robust efforts dairy farmers are leading to develop and implement climate-smart solutions that will benefit the entire food chain, from producer to consumer. As an agricultural leader in sustainability, dairy farmers appreciate this funding that will help us meet our ambitious industry-wide goals for net-zero emissions and optimized water use.

“NMPF is especially proud of the leadership its member cooperatives are showing in these critical areas, with several initiatives receiving significant USDA support. California Dairies Inc., Dairy Farmers of America, Land O’Lakes, and the Maryland & Virginia Milk Producers Cooperative Association – who are leading or partnering on specific projects that may receive up to $245 million in funding — each should be commended for their efforts, along with other dairy groups who are seeking to build a better future through climate-smart agriculture projects.”

California Water Crisis Challenges Dairy, Vanden Heuvel Says

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Water is front-of-mind for California dairy farmers, as scarcity is threatening to change the industry structure of the top U.S. dairy-producing state. While successful adjustments to a lower-water future are possible, the state badly needs moisture in the next few months to stave off greater immediate hardship for milk producers and improved government policy to help dairy prosper in the longer term, said Geoff Vanden Heuvel, director of regulatory and economic affairs for the California-based Milk Producers Council.

“I put 2,500 to 3,000 miles a month of my truck just driving up and down the Valley going to water meetings, and to see what’s been built here is just incredible and marvelous,” said Vanden Heuvel in a Dairy Defined podcast released today. “We’re running the risk of losing that if we don’t do some things intelligently.”

The full podcast is here. You can also find the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts and Amazon Music. A transcript is linked below. Broadcast outlets may use the MP3 file. Please attribute information to NMPF

NMPF’s Bjerga on Back to School (and Milk)

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga discusses the importance of milk to school nutrition programs in an interview with RFD- TV. According to consumer data, about 80 percent of the milk consumed by school-age children at home is whole or 2 percent milkfat varieties, neither of which are part of federal school nutrition programs.