National Farmers issued the following announcement on April 22.
Our nervousness a few months ago about dairy markets is now a full-blown disaster. In all my years in the
dairy business, I can’t recall anything even close to what we are seeing now.
I am grateful for the efforts our fellow organizations are making to get some much-needed supply management
in place. Any time you can’t sell milk at any price, and therefore have to dump it, demands such action. The
proposals put forward so far are somewhat different in approaches, but the goal they share is beyond question.
Supply management, as important as it is, cannot do the job alone. Too many of our farms were in tough
shape before we fell off a cliff, and now the prospect of bankruptcies and foreclosures hangs like a dark cloud
over more farms than ever. We must have a national moratorium on farm foreclosures. We cannot let market
disruptions resulting from legitimate efforts to control COVID-19 take such a toll on farm survival.
I would also like to add establishing a national milk marketing order, one covering all farmers all of the time,
to the list of things we need to do now. I say this for two reasons. First, the FMMO system was established to assure orderly milk marketing. If ever we needed orderly marketing, that time is now. The second reason is simple
practicality—the supply management proposals I have seen will work more efficiently if they are administered
through a proven system like the FMMOs.
As we put together policies to deal with the wolf at the door, we must not lose sight of where we want to be
when we wake up from our nightmare. Here, we have to be careful. The pandemic is showing all too clearly that
having too many cows, and too many of the workers who care for those cows, on single sites is risky. Better that
we have our cows and farmers spread out over the countryside on smaller sites.
Past experience has shown us that well-intentioned programs don’t always accomplish that goal. For example, payments based solely on production volume favor the very largest dairy farms. As another example, history has shown that supply management programs can buy out smaller, higher cost producers while their much larger counterparts take up the slack. At a minimum, programs must recognize the cost of production differences among dairies of different sizes. Programs must also have provisions that discourage expansion of new and existing very large farms.
Our Dairy Farm Structure Management Plan uses the combination of a national milk marketing order and
new pricing premiums to add value to the first million pounds per month produced by all farms. In doing so, it
helps preserve an industry structure that provides more food security than we have now. I encourage you to join
us in supporting this program.
There’s a lot going on in today’s dairy economy. Much of it seems out of our control. Much of it seems overwhelming.
But we will come out of it, one way or another. Let’s all work together to get the emergency programs we need now while we continue to build a more resilient system that benefits all dairy farmers.
Original source can be found here.
Source: National Farmers
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