Milk production

Description: Milk represents the raw equivalents of all dairy products including cheese, yoghurt, cream and milk consumed as the final product.
Data source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data
Unit: tonnes
Date range: 1961-2024
Last updated: 2026-02-25
Next expected update: 2027-02-25
Managed by: Pablo Rosado

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Documentation from data sources

UN FAO

Item: Milk, Total

Description: Milk, eggs, honey and beeswax are included as products of live animals. Fibres of animal origin (mainly wool and silk) are included with fibres of vegetal and animal origin. Milk and dairy products. Estimates of milk production as reported by countries refer to one or more of the following three concepts. Gross production is milk production plus milk sucked by young animals. Production available for consumption is net production less milk fed to animals, milk retained by farmers for food and feed, direct sales to consumers and farm waste. The FAO concept relates to net milk production. Data should be reported by kind of milking animal (cow, sheep, goat, etc.) in terms of whole milk and by weight. In most developed countries only 5-10 percent of whole milk is used directly for human consumption. The bulk of milk production is processed before being marketed as liquid milk (e. G. standardized, pasteurized, skimmed, etc.) or is manufactured in to products such as cream, butter, cheese, evaporated and condensed milk, milk powder, casein, yogurt, ice cream, etc. About 70 percent of whole milk is processed into dairy products; the by-products of these processes (e. G. skim milk, buttermilk and whey) are used either for feed or are manufactured into other dairy products, e. G. dry skim milk and low-fat cheese. Processed milk and dairy products are often supplemented with vitamins, mineral and various additives. FAO list 50 milk and dairy product items in the list that follows, of which five are primary products. Some food products containing milk are not listed separately by FAO, e. G. eggnog, sherbet, malted milk, chocolate milk drink and mellorine.

Metric: Production

Description: Amount produced in the year.

Data sources

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations – Production: Crops and livestock products

Crop and livestock statistics are recorded for 278 products, covering the following categories:

Crops primary: Cereals, Citrus Fruit, Fiber Crops, Fruit, Oil Crops, Oil Crops and Cakes in Oil Equivalent, Pulses, Roots and Tubers, Sugar Crops, Treenuts and Vegetables. Data are expressed in terms of area harvested, production quantity and yield. Cereals: Area and production data on cereals relate to crops harvested for dry grain only. Cereal crops harvested for hay or harvested green for food, feed or silage or used for grazing are therefore excluded.
Crops processed: Beer of barley; Cotton lint; Cottonseed; Margarine, short; Molasses; Oil, coconut (copra); Oil, cottonseed; Oil, groundnut; Oil, linseed; Oil, maize; Oil, olive, virgin; Oil, palm; Oil, palm kernel; Oil, rapeseed; Oil, safflower; Oil, sesame; Oil, soybean; Oil, sunflower; Palm kernels; Sugar Raw Centrifugal; Wine.
Live animals: Animals live n.e.s.; Asses; Beehives; Buffaloes; Camelids, other; Camels; Cattle; Chickens; Ducks; Geese and guinea fowls; Goats; Horses; Mules; Pigeons, other birds; Pigs; Rabbits and hares; Rodents, other; Sheep; Turkeys.
Livestock primary: Beeswax; Eggs (various types); Hides buffalo, fresh; Hides, cattle, fresh; Honey, natural; Meat (ass, bird nes, buffalo, camel, cattle, chicken, duck, game, goat, goose and guinea fowl, horse, mule, Meat nes, meat other camelids, Meat other rodents, pig, rabbit, sheep, turkey); Milk (buffalo, camel, cow, goat, sheep); Offals, nes; Silk-worm cocoons, reelable; Skins (goat, sheep); Snails, not sea; Wool, greasy.
Livestock processed: Butter (of milk from sheep, goat, buffalo, cow); Cheese (of milk from goat, buffalo, sheep, cow milk); Cheese of skimmed cow milk; Cream fresh; Ghee (cow and buffalo milk); Lard; Milk (dry buttermilk, skimmed condensed, skimmed cow, skimmed dried, skimmed evaporated, whole condensed, whole dried, whole evaporated); Silk raw; Tallow; Whey (condensed and dry); Yogurt.

Retrieved on

February 25, 2026

Retrieved from

http://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/QCL

Citation

This is the citation of the original data obtained from the source, prior to any processing or adaptation by Our World in Data.

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations – Production: Crops and livestock products (2025).

How to cite

How to cite this page

To cite this page overall, including any descriptions, FAQs or explanations of the data authored by Our World in Data, please use the following citation:

“Data Page: Milk production”, part of the following publication: Hannah Ritchie, Pablo Rosado, and Max Roser (2023) - “Agricultural Production”. Data adapted from Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Retrieved from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20261102-112946/grapher/milk-production-tonnes.html [online resource] (archived on November 2, 2026).

How to cite this data

If you have limited space (e.g. in data visualizations), you can use this abbreviated in-line citation:

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data

Full citation

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2025) – with major processing by Our World in Data. “Milk production – UN FAO” [dataset]. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, “Production: Crops and livestock products” [original data]. Retrieved November 2, 2026 from https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20261102-112946/grapher/milk-production-tonnes.html (archived on November 2, 2026).

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