“From Science, Plenty of Cows, but Little Profit,” was the titled of a New York Times piece written by William Neuman, and it offers insights on the state of the dairy industry today. While granting that technology has advanced the efficiency of all dairy farms, they explained the troubling times facing dairy producers in the markets. Check out this balanced article; it’s one worth reading. Here is an excerpt…

Three years ago, a technological breakthrough gave dairy farmers the chance to bend a basic rule of nature: no longer would their cows have to give birth to equal numbers of female and male offspring. Instead, using a high-technology method to sort the sperm of dairy bulls, they could produce mostly female calves to be raised into profitable milk producers.

Now the first cows bred with that technology, tens of thousands of them, are entering milking herds across the country — and the timing could hardly be worse.

The dairy industry is in crisis, with prices so low that farmers are selling their milk below production cost. The industry is struggling to cut output. And yet the wave of excess cows is about to start dumping milk into a market that does not need it.