Dairy Farmers

Carroll County dairy farmers strongly supported the concept of a Maryland milk commission yesterday at an informational meeting sponsored by the Maryland Farm Bureau and the Maryland Dairy Task Force.Twenty-nine of 30 farmers at the morning meeting said they wanted a commission to regulate the amount producers are paid for raw milk and wholesale milk prices.The commission, consisting of three consumers, two producers and one processor, would require wholesale distributors to sell milk at or above their processing costs.

Editor: It is with constant amazement that I read such articles as the editorial "Living Downstream. " It is fascinating to me that educated people could be so uninformed. I would love to watch the writer of this editorial drink some of the waste water that is "nearly as clean as what comes out of home spigots. " I personally know the man who laid the discharge papers from the sod run treatment plant out into the Bush River. The last records show that from September 2011 to March 28, 2012, 2 billion gallons of raw sewage was discharged into the bay and its tributaries from area municipalities.

WHEN IT COMES to setting milk prices, Maryland consumers seem to be running out of friends. The governor wants higher prices, the dairy farmers want higher prices and now processors seem to be caving in.Processors want to avoid another nasty legislative fight over a milk price-control bill, designed to prop up ailing dairy farmers but sock it to consumers through higher milk prices. Maryland grocers would be barred from offering discounts, specials or coupons on milk-related products.The state's five remaining processors also fear Maryland farmers will push for the state to join a cartel, the Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact, that wants to set milk prices regionally.

David Crowl, a dairy farmer from Street, was among more than 65 Dairy Farmers of America Inc. board members and young cooperators who visited Capitol Hill last month to discuss issues affecting the dairy industry. DFA members and staff convened in Washington, D.C., for the cooperative's annual D.C. Board Meeting and Hill Visits, where they conducted more than 175 visits with legislators. Crowl met Congressman Roscoe Bartlett, who represents northern Harford County, and his staff and the staffs of Maryland Sens.

MILK PRICES are coming down. Giant Food, the area's largest grocer, plans to lower its charge for a gallon of milk by six or eight cents. Given the chain's size, that will reverberate throughout the Baltimore-Washington region.But what is a positive for customers becomes another negative for this state's dairy farmers. They are caught in a bind: Fewer farms are churning out more gallons of milk; not surprisingly, the mandatory price for milk at the farm level -- set by the federalgovernment -- has just been cut in this region.

Seven years ago, when Maryland dairy farmers were fighting for the right to join a regional dairy compact to stem their steadily declining numbers, they were bitterly opposed by another major segment of the industry: the milk processors. Things haven't changed much today. Dairy farms still are disappearing in alarming numbers in Maryland. They are going out of business at a pace nearly twice the rate of the nation as a whole, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In rough numbers, Maryland had about 4,000 dairy farms in 1970.

A Wisconsin-based grass-roots organization created to boost the price farmers receive for their milk is seeking to establish a foothold in Maryland."We have got to do something," said Eddie Boyer, who milks 75 cows on his 160-acre farm a few miles south of Frederick. "There's no money in milking cows. Dairy farmers are going out of business every day, and nobody seems to care."Boyer, 39, and his wife, Beth, 37, are spearheading the recruiting efforts in Maryland for the American Raw Milk Producers Pricing Association (ARMPPA)

On the farm Like many dairy farmers, Kate and David Dallam hire a nutritionist to regulate the feed for their cows. Well aware that proper diet is crucial for a cow's health and milk production, the Dallams, owners of Bloom's Broom Dairy in Bel Air, learn the fat and protein content from reports every few days from the cooperative that processes the milk. Correct protein levels in feed are important, experts said. Too little leads to low milk production, and too much can be an expensive waste of feed.

Maryland dairy farmers have picked up the support of Gov. Parris N. Glendening in their battle for milk price control legislation designed to halt the decline in the number of dairy farms operating in the state.The governor said that he backs a bill in the General Assembly that would make Maryland part of an existing Northeast dairy compact that sets the price farmers receive for Class 1 (drinking) milk at a level that makes milking cows profitable."I support the legislation. I intend to work for the legislation and I will sign it," the governor told about 800 applauding farmers and lawmakers at the annual Maryland Agriculture Week banquet in Glen Burnie Thursday night.

David Patrick struck the equivalent of the lottery for a dairy farmer this month when he made almost $17,000 more than usual for his cows' monthly output of 330,000 pounds of milk.But subtract his costs for hauling the milk and for feeding his 175 cows, and barely enough remains for the Lisbon farmer to break even. For dairy farmers -- here and elsewhere -- even when times are good, they're bad."The last time prices got this high was back in the '80s," says Patrick, 66, who runs his 1,000-acre farm with his brother.

Ron Holter likes to say he's farming as God intended, without pesticides on the grass fields or hormones or antibiotics in the cows. But visitors to his organic dairy farm west of Frederick on Tuesday also heard about how the Earth, animals, consumers - and his pocketbook - are also benefiting. Holter, a fifth-generation farmer at Holterholm Farm in Jefferson, was host to a field day for about 50 farmers to spread the gospel. He's had the tours before, but this year he added speakers on grazing management, farm income and marketing from the day's sponsors at the Maryland Grazer's Network.

A man whose efforts to open a creamery at his Long Green Valley dairy farm had been thwarted by a few neighbors emerged victorious Thursday when the Baltimore County Council passed a zoning regulation that will allow him to sell organic products from the milk his cows produce. "This bill will support the county's $300 million agricultural industry, help meet our land preservation goals and help farmers supply fresh local produce to patrons," said Chris McCollum, agriculture liaison for the county's department of economic development.

As his 100 dairy cows lumbered over for their Monday afternoon milking, farmer Eric Foster pondered his sudden misfortune. Those Holsteins and Jerseys, profit machines during a recent milk boom, are now such money losers that he has begun selling part of his herd and fears he might have to quit the business altogether. It is not the cows' fault. The problem is the plummeting wholesale price of milk. It has fallen more than 40 percent in six months, driven down by disparate factors such as better rains in Australia, a tainted-milk scare in China and the global economic slowdown.

COLUMBUS, Wis. - Neighboring dairy farmers in Columbus, Wis., thought Jim Miller and his family had embarked on a path to bankruptcy when they decided to produce organic milk. How could you run a farm without chemicals and make milk for a market that barely existed? That was over a decade ago, and the neighbors turned out to be wrong. Organic became the sweet spot of the milk business, providing farmers such as Miller with more-stable prices, and often more profits, than conventional dairy operations see. But over the past year, the milk business has been turned on its head, with many organic farmers getting squeezed as never before and conventional dairy farmers enjoying the best of times.

The General Assembly has taken a baby step toward bringing Maryland in line with a handful of other East Coast states that have passed legislation to subsidize their beleaguered dairy farmers. State lawmakers have given preliminary approval to the creation of the Maryland Dairy Farmer Emergency Trust Fund, but with one giant drawback -- the bill lacks funding. The trust fund bill was designed to create a $15 million pot of money that the state agriculture secretary could distribute to dairy farmers when milk prices fell below the farmers' cost of production.

In hopes of addressing the decline of the dairy farming industry in Maryland, lawmakers plan to propose legislation in the coming session of the General Assembly aimed at bringing relief to beleaguered farmers. One measure under consideration would create a Maryland Dairy Emergency Fund, similar to those adopted in other East Coast states that have confronted difficulties with their dairy industries. The fund would subsidize the income of farmers during years of low milk prices. Such a fund was a primary recommendation of the Governor's Dairy Advisory Oversight Council.

A STATE MILK commission, by any name, is a blatant attempt to inflate dairy prices and disadvantage consumers for the benefit of a special interest group.It's a bad idea already rejected by nearly all states. It also runs contrary to national agricultural policies that aim to wean farmers from price supports to the free market.Furthermore, its goal is to promote the welfare of only dairy farmers, even to the detriment of other types of agriculture.Milk prices paid Maryland farmers are nearly three times what they were 30 years ago. Meantime, the number of farms and cows has dropped dramatically, while production levels remain the same.

As his 100 dairy cows lumbered over for their Monday afternoon milking, farmer Eric Foster pondered his sudden misfortune. Those Holsteins and Jerseys, profit machines during a recent milk boom, are now such money losers that he has begun selling part of his herd and fears he might have to quit the business altogether. It is not the cows' fault. The problem is the plummeting wholesale price of milk. It has fallen more than 40 percent in six months, driven down by disparate factors such as better rains in Australia, a tainted-milk scare in China and the global economic slowdown.

In hopes of addressing the decline of the dairy farming industry in Maryland, lawmakers plan to propose legislation in the upcoming session of the General Assembly aimed at bringing relief to beleaguered farmers. One measure under consideration would create a Maryland Dairy Emergency Fund, similar to those adopted in other East Coast states that have confronted difficulties with their dairy industries. The fund would subsidize the income of farmers during years of low milk prices. Such a fund was a primary recommendation of the governor's Dairy Industry Advisory and Oversight Council.

Reports on the damage done to crops by this summer's drought are beginning to roll in, and they don't bode well for Maryland farmers. Many grain farmers, particularly those on the Lower Eastern Shore and in Southern Maryland, can only stand by and watch as a lack of rain dries up their hopes of a bountiful fall harvest. "It's disheartening," Maryland Agriculture Secretary Roger L. Richardson said. "There are areas of the state where the drought is every bit as bad as the one in 2002." The 2002 drought was considered the worst in more than a century, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture declared 21 of Maryland's 23 counties agriculture-disaster areas.