O pening the conference was a presentation by Monte Hemenover of Monsanto who spoke about the dairy industry going into the 21st century and the great opportunities for milk producers. He is optimistic about the future because per capita consumption of milk and milk products will continue to increase and export markets will provide additional sales opportunities. F or the past two years, commercial disappearance of milk has surpassed milk production. Milk marketing myth number one is that we have too much milk. With these increases, the industry needs to focus on cheese.
Cheese is the driver.
C heese production is expected to increase in the coming years and the only way it won't increase is if milk producers don't produce enough milk. Producers can meet the demand through higher milk production per cow. Hemenover added that if we look at milk consumption to 2005, we do not have the manufacturing plants to meet U.S. cheese production needs. H emenover recommended milk producers have a five-year business plan and a board of directors to set the direction of the operation. Producers should also work on improving milk quality.