Dairy prices defy ample supply as market momentum builds
Global dairy prices continue to rise despite ample supply from key milk producing countries including New Zealand.
Despite four consecutive drops in Global Dairy Trade (GDT) prices, analysts are sticking with a payout of around $7.20/kgMS for this season.
Westpac markets strategist Imre Speizer says the futures market for 2019-20 farmgate milk price remains stuck at $7.20/kg, where it has been since early February.
Speizer notes that this unsurprising given 80% of the season’s production volumes, as well as most sales, are known.
“That is in line with our own forecast for this season of $7.20,” he says.
Rabobank analyst Emma Higgins anticipates a milk price $7.35/kgMS, a decline of 35c.
Last week Fonterra reaffirmed its milk price range of $7 to $7.60/kgMS.
For the 2020/21 milk price, futures are predicting a price of $6.20/kgMS, from a pre-virus peak of $7.30 in January.
Both Westpac and Rabobank are reviewing their 2020-21 forecast prices and will report in the coming weeks.
The sale of Fonterra’s global consumer and related businesses is expected to be completed within two months.
Fonterra is boosting its butter production capacity to meet growing demand.
For the most part, dairy farmers in the Waikato, Bay of Plenty, Tairawhiti and the Manawatu appear to have not been too badly affected by recent storms across the upper North Island.
South Island dairy production is up on last year despite an unusually wet, dull and stormy summer, says DairyNZ lower South Island regional manager Jared Stockman.
Following a side-by-side rolling into a gully, Safer Farms has issued a new Safety Alert.
Coming in at a year-end total at 3088 units, a rise of around 10% over the 2806 total for 2024, the signs are that the New Zealand farm machinery industry is turning the corner after a difficult couple of years.