The National Milk Producers Federation’s chief economist says 2020 dairy markets turned into a giant “M” for the year with record highs and lows.

“The story of the year is cheese prices.”

Peter Vitaliono says cheese prices tanked to a record low in March following pandemic shutdowns, then turned sharply higher during the first purchases of USDA’s Farmers to Family Food Box program.  When those slowed, the market dropped some, but then the second round of purchases, along with some food service reopening, again brought another turn of highs and lows to prices.

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