Colombian farmgate milk prices rise 7% annually as drought raises feeding costs
The Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadística (DANE) recorded the prices through its Sistema de Información de Precios y Abastecimiento del Sector Agropecuario (SIPSA). Its survey covered 208 municipalities across 25 departments, organised into five production macroregions. The findings appeared in DANE’s technical bulletin 168, published on October 15 and analysed by CONtexto Ganadero on November 9. All five macroregions retained their monthly stability classification, although individual municipalities recorded increases exceeding 5%, associated with changes in milk availability and demand for dairy products.
In Arauca, prices increased in four of the five municipalities surveyed. Farmers in Arauquita received 9.51% more than in July, while the increase in Tame was 7.42%. DANE attributed Arauquita’s movement to higher prices for cheese sold to Colombia’s interior, alongside reduced milk availability. Demand for milk used in cheesemaking helped lift local prices.
Bolívar recorded significant increases in seven of its nine surveyed municipalities. Prices rose by 6.85% in El Carmen de Bolívar and 6.84% in María la Baja. In the latter municipality, insufficient rainfall restricted forage growth and made livestock feeding more difficult. Farmers added mineral salts, silage, concentrates and molasses to their animals’ diets as pasture supplies diminished. Such supplementation can add to farms’ feeding expenses.
Feeding and water difficulties also affected other departments. In San Miguel de Sema, Boyacá, the absence of rain during August reduced water availability for livestock. Producers in Susa, Cundinamarca, and Pupiales, Nariño, reported declines in both pasture quantity and quality. Frost and wind hampered pasture recovery in Cauca and Valle del Cauca. Some farms responded by increasing their use of concentrates, silage and agricultural by-products, including potatoes, carrots and crop residues. The additional feed requirements can increase production expenses and change the relationship between milk receipts and costs.
Conditions differed in Antioquia, where the report highlighted good pasture quality associated with rotational grazing. Farms there had more favourable conditions for using pasture than establishments facing shortages and increasing their reliance on supplementary feed. The report described differences in forage conditions and pasture management across Colombia’s producing regions.
The SIPSA figure measures prices for raw milk at the farm gate. The Ministry of Agriculture maintains a separate series for milk collected through formal industrial channels, using a different methodology. Coverage and marketing conditions differ between the two systems and can produce different price readings.
