It’s May 8th. Do you know where your tariff is?



When the tariff winds shift, the Jacoby team is there to help you steer your strategy. Tune in to the latest episode of The Milk Check with special guest Will Loux from the U.S. Dairy Export Council, as we cover:








Tariff tensions – How will ongoing trade talks between the U.S. and China impact dairy exports?



Shifting trade strategies – How are global buyers adjusting to new tariff realities, and where does the U.S. stand in this complex landscape?



Innovation and adaptation – What moves should U.S. producers and buyers make to adapt and thrive amidst tariff uncertainty?




Don’t miss this conversation as we explore how tariffs are reshaping the dairy trade and what the future holds for U.S. dairy exports.



Listen now to The Milk Check episode 77: Tariff talk with Will Loux from the U.S. Dairy Export Council











Intro (with music):



Welcome to The Milk Check, a podcast from TC Jacoby & Company where we share market insights and analysis with dairy farmers in mind.



Ted Jacoby III:



Welcome, everybody, to this week's version of The Milk Check. It is May 1st, 2025. Once again, we're going to revisit the topic of tariffs and international trade. And as everybody knows, it's a shifting landscape. We have a special guest today, Will Loux from the US Dairy Export Council. Will is Senior Vice President of Global Economic Affairs. Will, thanks for joining us today.



Will Loux:



Thanks for having me, Ted. Good to be on.



Ted Jacoby, III:



We also have some of our usual suspects. Mike Brown, VP of Dairy Market Intelligence, Miguel Aragon, our director of Latin America Cheese Sales, and Josh White, our VP of Dairy Ingredients, and Tristan Sellentrup. Thanks for joining us, guys.



So Will, we're going to start in the obvious place. What is DC's attitude about everything that's going on in tariffs, especially with regards to dairy? Do you see anything changing anytime soon? Is there anything in the works? What's the landscape as you see it?



Will Loux:



There's a lot of uncertainty. We were talking about several different types of tariffs that are effectively going on because we have our bilateral relationship with China where we have very high tariffs both for products coming into the US and China has very high tariffs for our dairy products going out, but we also have the 10% universal tariff. We have the steel and aluminum tariff. We have the USMCA question marks between Canada, Mexico, everything else.



So right, now I would say there's about four different tariff balls being juggled all at once. And as far as where we're going in DC, I think that's anyone's guess where obviously within national milk and the Export Council, very hard at work these days. Very grateful. Jaime and Shauna and Tony Rice on our trade policy team get to live this every day while I get to check out, I guess, what's happening in the markets.



Ted Jacoby, III:



There's been rumors that China and the US are talking and they're trying to work out some things that could lower those tariffs. What are you hearing?



Will Loux:



Good question. Right now, at least what we've heard is there are talks, at least attempting to. I don't know how far along these talks have gotten. When we look at the tariffs between the US and China right now,