{"id":73984,"date":"2016-10-11T21:13:38","date_gmt":"2016-10-12T01:13:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=73984"},"modified":"2016-10-11T21:13:38","modified_gmt":"2016-10-12T01:13:38","slug":"column-are-dairy-farmers-being-conditioned-to-accept-low-milk-prices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=73984","title":{"rendered":"COLUMN: Are Dairy Farmers Being Conditioned to Accept Low Milk Prices?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"opinion_letters1\"<\/a>By Arden Tewksbury<\/em><\/p>\n

I was astonished when I was informed that some national agriculture magazines and other Ag news outlets are basically saying, \u201cTake your present milk prices and shut up!\u201d<\/p>\n

They are saying that $24 milk was once in a lifetime and don\u2019t think it will happen again.\u00a0They are also saying the so-called three-year pricing cycle is done, so accept what you get! Whoa! Let\u2019s stop a second.<\/p>\n

Yes, in 2014 the Federal Order #1 price was over $25 three times, and in September it was $26.16 per cwt. (hundred-weight); however, in August 2011 it came in at $23.22 per cwt.\u00a0And in August 2007, the price was $23.14 per cwt.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But, of course, one must remember many of the years that milk prices were half of these higher prices,\u00a0such as 2009, 2003, 2002\u00a0and the year of 2000 when order reform was put in place; however, many people just don\u2019t seem to realize that dairy farmers do have a cost of operate their farms.<\/p>\n

The worst thing for dairy farmers to have to combat with is the topsy-turvy milk pricing formula that dairy farmers have to live with.\u00a0(Let\u2019s never forget the unreliable weather systems.)<\/p>\n

The second worse thing is the cost of production it takes to run a farm.\u00a0 While many dairy farmers take steps to control these costs, there are many costs that are not controllable.\u00a0 (The ill-fated margin insurance programs illustrate this in #2; however maybe number 3 is equally as important as number #1 and #2.)<\/p>\n

God help the people that keep telling dairy farmers to produce more and more milk.\u00a0Remember the ones that told you to produce more milk-more milk for the export markets.\u00a0Please remember the politicians who advised the dairy farmers to produce more and more milk for all of the new yogurt plants.\u00a0Look what happened.\u00a0(Don\u2019t forget the threat of $8 per gallon milk prices.)<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the answer to all of this malarkey?<\/p>\n

Dairy farmers (and handlers and consumers) deserve a new pricing formula that will give dairy farmers a fighting chance to cover their cost.\u00a0Equally important:\u00a0a workable supply management program must be implemented to keep the supply of milk in line with the domestic market.<\/p>\n

Arden Tewksbury of Pro-Ag can be reached at 570-833-5776<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Arden Tewksbury I was astonished when I was informed that some national agriculture magazines and other Ag news outlets are basically saying, \u201cTake your present milk prices and shut up!\u201d They are saying that $24 milk was once in a lifetime and don\u2019t think it will happen again.\u00a0They are also saying the so-called three-year […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70071,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[23679,23677,23808,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-agfarming","category-columns","category-opinion","category-top-story"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p43meu-jfi","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/opinion_letters1.jpg?fit=570%2C300&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/70071"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}