RFD Livestock Report 10-8-26 Corey Geiger Ag Economist-World Dairy Expo Person of the Year-
Oct 8, 2026 · 4 min · 4 segments
- Speakers
Corey GeigerGuestRita FrazerHost
Oct 8, 2026 · 4 min · 4 segments
Corey GeigerGuestRita FrazerHost
Um, cottage cheese, high-protein dairy shakes, and yogurt are nearly all growing double digits.
Uh, near term, though, and the other thing is young people, young farmers can invest in their dairies with the certainty there'll be a home for their milk.
We have $14 billion of new dairy processing investment coming online through 2028, and quite a bit that's already come online.
Um, th- those are all positive things, and beef on dairy is accounting for about 20% of farm income compared to 5% just five years ago.
Now, near term, getting closer to the markets, Class Four prices are averaging $19 to $20 per hundredweight, Class Four being butter and powder largely.
When you add beef on dairy, certainly farmers are being profitable, but not as much as they would be.
We're making a lot of butterfat, and we need to h- find a home for that butterfat.
And when we rebalance that internationally, uh, Class Three prices should rebound.
So how do we bridge that, Cory? So from the demand and the processing and, you know, what's on the horizon for protein right now, that it's having more than a minute.
How do we, you know, build, uh, the dairy farms back? Because we've lost so many.
The one thing that we, uh, the industry, we're actually at a 34-year high in cows.
So while dairy farm numbers do, uh, go down, the number of c- dairy cows in this country continues to climb, partially because of this protein having a, beyond a moment here.
This is a structural shift, and I think four things encouraged that to happen in the, uh, in consumer markets.
Number one, c- consumers coming out of, uh, the pandemic, looking at health, heal- as food as medicine, and so looking for cleaner ingredient labels.
Um, cottage cheese, high-protein dairy shakes, and yogurt are nearly all growing double digits.
Uh, near term, though, and the other thing is young people, young farmers can invest in their dairies with the certainty there'll be a home for their milk.
We have $14 billion of new dairy processing investment coming online through 2028, and quite a bit that's already come online.
Um, th- those are all positive things, and beef on dairy is accounting for about 20% of farm income compared to 5% just five years ago.
Now, near term, getting closer to the markets, Class Four prices are averaging $19 to $20 per hundredweight, Class Four being butter and powder largely.
When you add beef on dairy, certainly farmers are being profitable, but not as much as they would be.
We're making a lot of butterfat, and we need to h- find a home for that butterfat.
And when we rebalance that internationally, uh, Class Three prices should rebound.
So how do we bridge that, Cory? So from the demand and the processing and, you know, what's on the horizon for protein right now, that it's having more than a minute.
How do we, you know, build, uh, the dairy farms back? Because we've lost so many.
The one thing that we, uh, the industry, we're actually at a 34-year high in cows.
So while dairy farm numbers do, uh, go down, the number of c- dairy cows in this country continues to climb, partially because of this protein having a, beyond a moment here.
This is a structural shift, and I think four things encouraged that to happen in the, uh, in consumer markets.
Number one, c- consumers coming out of, uh, the pandemic, looking at health, heal- as food as medicine, and so looking for cleaner ingredient labels.
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