News US dairy consumption
Americans are eating more and more dairy products
In the United States, dairy consumption per capita is still rising. That's according to research based on the annual figures of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). Rising dairy consumption does not guarantee a growth in liquid milk consumption.
There has been an upward trend in the dairy consumption of the average American for years. In 2019, dairy consumption increased by 7 pounds (about 3,2 kilograms) per capita to a total of 653 pounds (about 296,8 kilograms) per year. This increase is the fourth largest increase in the past decade. Consumption of liquid dairy, on the other hand, has been declining for years. In 3, 2019 pounds (about 4 kilograms) less milk was drunk compared to the previous year.
Cheese and butter
The plus is mainly in the consumption of cheese and butter. Cheese consumption per capita has been higher than the consumption of liquid milk since the mid-80s. In 2019, American cheese consumption was about 15,5 pounds (about 7 kilograms) per capita. Other cheeses consumed about 22,8 pounds (about 10,7 kilograms) per head.
Butter consumption has been increasing or remaining stable since 2002. In 2019, the average American ate about 6,2 pounds (about 2,8 kilograms) of butter per year. A small increase of just 0,2 pounds from 2018. Still, U.S. residents have been eating nearly 2 pounds of butter more since 2002.
Liquid dairy
The trend of decreasing liquid dairy consumption while increasing butter and cheese consumption has been going on since 1975. Since 2000, consumption has declined by 55 pounds (25 kilograms) to 141 pounds (about 64,1 kilograms) per capita. The decline can be seen in both the volume of liquid dairy and the percentage of liquid dairy in total dairy consumption. While liquid dairy still accounted for 1975% of the total in 46, in 2019 this is only 22%.
Another picture that stands out in liquid dairy consumption is the change in purchases between semi-skimmed dairy products and full-fat products. In 2019, approximately 46,4 billion pounds of liquid dairy was purchased, 16 billion of which were full-fat dairy products. That amount had not been achieved since 2007. So there seems to be a reversal in the type of dairy consumed, although the increase in full-fat dairy products was not enough to compensate for the decrease in semi-skimmed (-2%) and low-fat (-1%) dairy products to boost the total again .
Jorine Cosse
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