Economics
The Texas dairy industry boosts local, state and national economies.
Jobs and income are generated when farmers purchase machinery, trucks, fuel and other equipment; buy feed and healthcare for their animals; and use services such as banking and insurance. And after the milk leaves the farm, it continues to create jobs in transportation, distribution, processing and retail markets.
Dairy feeds the Texas economy:
- 351 Grade A dairies with an estimated 586,395 cows produced more than 14.8 billion pounds of milk (more than 1.7 billion gallons) in 2020, up 7% from 2019.
- The average dairy herd has 1,487 cows (fifth nationally), and each cow produces an average of 2,861 gallons of milk per year, or about 7.84 gallons per day.
- Both Texas milk production and milk output per cow rank fifth nationally.
- Dairy delivers a $50.3 billion total state economic impact (direct and indirect).
- Dairy contributes $1.6 billion in state taxes in Texas.
- Dairy (milk and cows) brought in more than $2.4 billion in total cash receipts in 2019, with a $1.8 billion total contribution to Texas’ gross domestic product. Texas dairies contribute 2.8% of the state’s GDP.
- Milk produced in Texas in 2018 had an estimated value of almost $2 billion, which is 7.86% of the total value of all Texas agriculture commodity production.
- 253,000 total jobs (direct and indirect) with $12.7 billion in wages are created by the Texas dairy industry.
- Texas dairy exports total $486.2 million.