--- title: America Has a Cheese Problem That’s Only Going to Get Worse description: America is stockpiling cheese, the price is coming down and dairy farmers could be in for trouble as a result. authors: - name: Allana Akhtar url: https://money.com/author/allana-akhtar/ at_money_since: 2017 articles: 101 covers: - Economy and Politics - Business - Career Advice - Education - Identity Theft - Lifestyle - Loans - Personal Finance - Retirement - Shopping - Technology former_staff: true published: '2018-06-29T15:30:36.000Z' modified: '2024-04-17T10:39:53.000Z' section: Economy and Politics tags: - Food - trump tariffs word_count: 271 canonical: https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![cheese warehouse](https://img.money.com/2018/06/180628-cheese.jpg) Americans have more cheese than ever before — and that stinks for cheesemakers. Currently, the U.S. has 1.39 billion pounds of cheese in storage, according to the [Department of Agriculture](http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/usda/current/ColdStor/ColdStor-06-22-2018.pdf) and that equates to roughly [4 pounds of cheese for every American](https://qz.com/1317296/the-usa-is-hoarding-cheese/). Why so much? There are two main factors. Cheese is piling up due to a [dwindling demand for milk](https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2017/05/16/528460207/why-are-americans-drinking-less-cows-milk-its-appeal-has-curdled), yet farmers are on target to produce a whopping [218.7 billion pounds](https://www.dairyherd.com/article/total-cheese-cold-storage-hits-record-high-april) of milk by December. On top of that, cheese, butter and milk powder store better than fluid milk, resulting in a surplus of cheddar and Swiss. Extra cheese means lower prices, which spells trouble for farmers. The current price is at $15.36 per 100 pounds, which is a dollar below the average for 2017, according to *[The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/06/28/americas-cheese-stockpile-just-hit-an-all-time-high/?utm_term=.3856e92da17f)*. President Donald Trump's trade war with China and Mexico isn't helping the situation. Currently, the cheese industry is trying to step in. The more than 60 dairy associations and cheese makers — including the U.S. Dairy Export Council and the International Dairy Foods Association — wrote a letter to Trump asking him to suspend tariffs on Mexican products. Mexico consumes a quarter of foreign demand for American dairy, but that could change when a 25% tariff on fresh cheese hits on [July 5th](http://blog.usdec.org/usdairyexporter/how-our-dairy-exports-to-mexico-boost-us-economy-0-0-0-0?_ga=2.46347175.1817954535.1529941116-1720717772.1520278739). If the tariffs stay in place for more than six months, dairy farmers need to find new markets for cheese, and can expect milk prices to continue to fall, according to a [report](https://research.rabobank.com/far/en/sectors/dairy/dare_not_to_dairy.html) from agribusiness research firm Rabobank. If the trend continues in the longterm, the report notes, it could be detrimental for dairy exporters. ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Economy and Politics", "item": "https://money.com/economy-and-politics/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "Economy", "item": "https://money.com/economy/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "America Has a Cheese Problem That’s Only Going to Get Worse" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/", "name": "America Has a Cheese Problem That’s Only Going to Get Worse", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2018-06-29T15:30:36.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-04-17T10:39:53.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "America Has a Cheese Problem That’s Only Going to Get Worse", "articleSection": "Economy and Politics", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2018/06/180628-cheese.jpg", "width": 3069, "height": 2020, "caption": "180628-cheese" } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Allana Akhtar", "url": "https://money.com/author/allana-akhtar/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/allana-akhtar/#author" } ], "publisher": "https://money.com/#organization", "datePublished": "2018-06-29T15:30:36.000Z", "description": "America is stockpiling cheese, the price is coming down and dairy farmers could be in for trouble as a result.", "abstract": "America is stockpiling cheese, the price is coming down and dairy farmers could be in for trouble as a result.", "@id": "https://money.com/cheese-excess-trump-tariffs-mexico/", "inLanguage": "en-US", "dateModified": "2024-04-17T10:39:53.000Z", "wordCount": 271, "keywords": [ "Food", "trump tariffs" ], "about": [ { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Political economy", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_economy" ] }, { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Economy", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy" ] } ] } ] } ```