Precision Dairy Farming, Robotic Milking, and Profitability in the United States
- by Jonathan McFadden and Zach Raff
- 1/22/2026
Overview
ERS research shows that U.S. adoption of precision dairy technologies related to milking, breeding, and data systems has increased steadily since 2000. These technologies include sensors, data analytics, and automation, among others, which help operators to manage at the cow rather than herd level. This report finds that robotic milking, or use of two or more precision technologies from the broader set of technologies studied, increases U.S. farmers’ dairy net returns by 13 percent on average.
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