That’s the short answer.

The more detailed answer involves reading a 109-page document, “U.S. Department of Agriculture Report to Congress on the Dairy Promotion and Research Program and the Fluid Processor Promotion Program, 2015 Program Activities.”

That report gives a thorough analysis of the 15 cents per hundredweight that every dairy farmer contributes to fund dairy product research and promotion. In its independent analysis, Texas A&M University found the following:

• For every $1 spent by dairy farmers in demand-enhancing activities, the benefits received back by dairy farmers were $2.99 for fluid milk. That’s a 3 to 1 return on investment.
  
  
• For every $1 invested in cheese, the benefits were $7.72. That’s a 7.7 to 1 return on investment.
  
  
• For every $1 invested in butter, the benefits were $32.06. That’s a 32 to 1 return on investment.

While we would like to see higher fluid milk sales and a higher return on investment from fluid milk, if we hadn’t invested in fluid milk promotion and research, sales would have likely fallen even more. As for cheese and butter, those products have been setting new per capita sales totals in recent years.