US: The dairy exports keep increasing in April

April proved to be another robust month of growth for US dairy exports. Milk solids equivalent volume grew 25% compared to April 2020, with gains across all major US dairy products. Cheese led the way with a surprising increase of 51% (+13,687 tonnes) with whey (+28%, +11,757 tonnes) and skim milk powder just behind (+16%, +10,559 tonnes). With the US shipping larger volumes of higher priced products such as cheese and whey protein concentrates, the value of US exports increased by 33%. Overall, the picture is clearly optimistic. Still, we must include some caveats. The scale of the growth was almost certainly made possible by an improvement in the port situation in April, which allowed US exporters to clear their shipping books for the fourth quarter of 2020 and early 2021. In addition, the country's cheese exports in April 2020 were weakened by the global pandemic making the month of comparison particularly favorable. However, even considering these caveats, the data suggest an ...