According to Longwarry dairy farmer John Versteden​, who runs 700 dairy cows, the benefits of the Trans-Pacific Partnership should be seen in tandem with free trade deals Australia recently agreed with China, Korea and Japan.

"To me the bigger impacts are probably about the opportunities that those agreements present," he said. "They give us access, or greater access to markets that we probably haven't had before, not on a fair basis anyway."

For the Australian dairy industry the benefits of the FTA with China far outweigh those of the TPP, but Mr Versteden said the new trade agreement between 12 Pacific nations, like the other recent trade agreements, was a step towards fairer trade rules.

Some of the benefits for the dairy industry from the latest agreement include quite significant tariff cuts on dairy exports to Japan, one of Australia's largest dairy customers, as well as a 9000-tonne increase in the volume of Australian cheese exports allowed into the US tariff-free. Adam Jenkins, president of the United Dairyfarmers of Victoria, described the TPP as a "modest" deal for dairy, but a small and positive step towards further global trade liberalisation.

Asked why trade agreements were important for Australia's dairy industry, which exports about 40 per cent of its production, Mr Versteden said: "Our future is on the export market, because domestic growth is fairly minimal. We are a growing industry and we're cost-competitive ... We've got a good low-cost base and I think we've got a fairly strong strategic future on international markets."

But in addition to the level playing field, tariffs and quotas, Mr Versteden said the new trade agreements would give farmers something very valuable – confidence.

"I think confidence is an amazing thing," he said. "(If) you know that the world wants more of your product and that you can trade it on a fair basis, (and) you know that you're cost competitive – it gives you the confidence to grow if that's what you wish."

President of the Australian Dairy Farmers group Noel Campbell said the new agreement was "a good result" for Australian dairy farmers.

"Along with the China Free Trade Agreement it gives people an understanding that if they're going to grow their business, they've got a market to grow into," he said.

The TPP would mean a lot more Australian cheese could be exported to Japan tariff-free, he said. "And we've also got greater access for butter and skim milk powder than what we've had previously," he said.

But an industry insider said the TPP did not deliver serious gains to Australia's dairy industry: "The USA was never serious about dairy trade reform, and that meant that there was never going to be serious gains on dairy in the TPP."