Editor’s note: The following remarks were presented by the National Milk Producers Federation chairman Randy Mooney at the organization’s annual meeting in Phoenix, Ariz., on October 22.

It's great to be in Phoenix today, back with you talking about an industry that is probably the hardest industry in the world, but it's one that we're all passionate about and we all love. We always talk about change at these meetings, but I see more happening today than I ever have, more happening today that's going to affect our lives, than I see that's ever happening, and it's going to happen probably in the next 12 months.

There's a lot going on. We're making decisions on everything we do. And it's complicated sometimes to see where people are coming from, but that's the thing you always want to dig into. You want to try to understand that. You want to try to understand where people are coming from to help us get to a consensus.

We’ve seen opportunities that are available. This has been a monumental year, as the work we've done for the past year and beyond has been instrumental in setting us up for continued success. We haven't dove into the Federal Milk Marketing Order system to change it like we have this year for about 20 years. We’ve got a farm bill that's being talked about, food safety, dietary guidelines, and many others.

Farming is hard. We all know that. But when you get hit with weather events like hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, droughts, the list goes on and on, unexpected costs, that makes it even harder. You get hit with things like bird flu that a year ago we didn't even know was a problem here. These weather events, these things that are unexpected, these things put strains on farms, put strains on families, put strains on financials.

Labor continues to be a challenge. We don't see people knocking our door down to want to work on our farms. But we continue to push forward and work toward a better industry. This is our time to make every drop count and reimagine dairy, reimagine who we could be, and to reimagine how we capture more value for our farms for what we do.

Dairy already maintains a large share of the consumer’s plate. According to Circana, dairy is now the largest category in retail grocery with $76 billion sales. So, we're there. As dairy farmers, we're there as part of the largest category; 92% of households have milk in the refrigerator. That's pretty phenomenal. There's more than just milk in U.S. households. There's 97% cheese, 82% yogurt, 82% ice cream, and 79% frozen novelties. But when you look at the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 90% of consumers still don't get enough dairy.

So, we continue to innovate, continue to bring new products. We're working to improve kids' experience with milk at schools. We fought to keep flavored milk in schools, and we'll keep fighting to increase the fat levels. That's something that all of us are interested in. And we reimagine how we meet changing consumer demands around the world since 18% of our milk goes to exports.

In everything we do, the future is going to take a level of cooperation and coordination from all of us. And I continue to be inspired by all of you and the work that you're doing. Amid great change and preparation for the future, we are still part of the greatest industry that there is. We feed people around the world, providing nourishment to people who need it the most. Even when it feels like we're surrounded by challenges and issues in our world, we can be proud of being part of this industry. We are part of something bigger, bigger than our farms, bigger than our cooperatives, bigger than ourselves, in a time of seismic change. We get to be leaders in the best industry that there is.

We get to reimagine our responsibility. It's a responsibility that we don't take lightly and an opportunity we will capitalize on for dairy farmers today and those who will carry us into the future. I appreciate each and every one of you being here and what you mean to this industry. Thank you very much.