New Zealand Tackles the Pandemic in the Dairy Sector
New Zealand managed to set a new record in dairy goods manufacturing in 2019/2020, despite lower cow numbers. The increase in milk processing saw a 0.6% increase from last year with 21.1 billion liters of the handled product. The farmers seem to enhance the quality and productivity as the production efficiency saw a raise of 4kgMS from last season to a current average of 385kgMS per cow. This is despite the overall cow number declining by 0.5% from the previous season and now amounting to 4.921 million.
The exports from New Zealand are estimated to be worth $20 billion annually. New Zealand remains a major non-EU exporter of dairy goods in 2020, although it noted a slight loss in exported products in comparison to 2019. Butteroil exports hit the biggest curb with an 8% decrease amounting to 335 metric tonnes, while cheese and Skimmed Milk Powder saw a 6% and 5% decrease respectively. Nevertheless, the producers are content with the export interest for those commodities this year. Whole Milk Powder saw just a 1% decline still amounting to 1 128 metric tonnes of the product successfully exported. The demand for WHP export is good and based on already agreed contracts, is expected to further continue. The pricing level of WMP is projected to bring the producers a satisfactory gain.
With enhanced demand for export from Asia, milk prices may be on the rise. In December, Fonterra raised the midpoint of the projected milk price range by $0.20 to $7.00 per kgMS.
