The Dairy Katrina

By Troy Bishopp

I went to a dairy crisis meeting at Morrisville College(my alma mater) with the intention to capture a story for Lancaster Farming and bring back some knowledge to local dairy farmers I know couldn’t attend because of haymaking. As I passed the tables decked out in dairy products, I couldn’t help the eerie feeling of a portly security officer standing at the door ushering us in. What was I walking into? These are family dairy farmers not some criminals. My attitude changed almost immediately from this symbolism. I thought about my grandfathers participating in the 1939 New York milk strike and my own demise of selling the dairy herd in 1989 because of 10 dollar milk. I’d been here before.

I grabbed a few shots of the 200 plus crowd and took my seat with pen in hand figuring this would be a Pulitzer prize article while doing justice to the plight of my friends, but the reality is, I’m a terrible news reporter: I have no formal training, I can’t write fast enough, can’t spell, my camera doesn’t work in low light and my attention span gets cluttered with emotion. So this becomes a farmer bias piece of writing. Sorry Lancaster Farming. I did manage to grab a few sound bites that you will appreciate.

Dave Rama of the Cattle Exchange set the tone for me when he said, “This dairy pricing crisis is our Katarina. It is a systematic destruction and alienation of the nation’s dairy industry. We need to come together and fight back.” You have to love a person’s passion even if you’ve heard it all before. John Bunting, a small dairy farmer and writer for the Milkweed, did a good job of describing how we got to this point again, especially when parity pricing ended with President Reagan’s pen. I thoroughly enjoyed Kurt Williams, General Manager of Lanco-Pennland Cooperative, for his play by play comments to some poignant graphs and issues. The most important one was the disparity over the data collected by the USDA and how it didn’t jive with real industry numbers. We all laughed when he said, “Government is like pushing a chain uphill.” Processors, MPC’s, imports, de-pooling, CME and Federal Milk pricing were all discussed as culprits in this low pricing mess. This is a kind statement.

It didn’t take long for the two microphones in the aisles to lure farmers and consumers to weigh in. I really appreciate the rawness and honesty that a farmer brings to the table. I find this venue an interesting cross section of opinions and personalities. It’s more about farmers making frustration statements than asking questions. Tammy Graves of Frankfort, N.Y said they sent over 8000 petitions and signatures to Agriculture Secretary, Tom Vilsack, wanting help and got no response from the office. I suppose the office could have sent a thank you at least. Debbie Windecker, also from Frankfort, chimed in by asking, “Are there any dairy processors here to hear us?” You could hear a pin drop. At that point Mr. Bunting reviewed the record profits dairy processors made in the first quarter and more people lined up. It was great to see farm wives start the dialogue followed by mature men folk and their chicken scratch notes detailing their views on dairy policy. There were plenty of young people there also. I couldn’t help but feel I was in an infomercial directed at legislators from Albany and Washington as well as the scant press that was there.

I saw a TV camera so I decided to see how an interview from professionals and chosen spokesman are done. Watching people put on the spot by impromptu questions is unsettling, but highly educational for this farmer. Dave Rama got worked up about the price of water versus the price of milk and the MPC’s in stringy pizza cheese. Bradd Vickers from Chenango County Farm Bureau was cool and collected talking about unsustainable prices and how consumers have benefited from the farmer’s hard work. And NY Assemblyman Pete Lopez, who I inspired to do the interview holding a pint of milk, talked about China’s dairy imports and stabilizing the milk price now and working towards a long term solution. It went fine, however seeing it on News10now (http://news10now.com/content/top_stories/477535/dairy-farmers-say-they-need-immediate-action) showed me good work doesn’t always translate to the big screen. Dave’s comments were cut off and had no closure as a result. Bradd scored big with the Farm Bureau logo on his shirt but his Florida style hat didn’t really say dairy farmer. Pete did well but the milk bottle he was holding was barely visible. No interview from any producing dairy farmers or wives and the background pictures used in the piece included shots of a barn fan, manure tanker truck, freestall cows and someone cutting the cheese. Where were the pastoral landscapes of Central NY dairy country, farm kids or cute calves? Does the consumer see a catastrophic dairy crisis or understand what they can do from this media or increased attention? I would say maybe at best.

This brings me to a point that I personally struggle with along with my dairy neighbors. What can we do to stop the predator/prey relationship of this milk crisis that happens every 2-4 years? A Dairy Price Stabilization Program? Parity pricing? Stop paying for trucking and advertisement of milk you don’t own in the bulk tank? Enforcing Antitrust laws already on the books? Milk strikes? Etc. Many of my friends want government completely out of the dairy industry. What effect would that have? My take after the meeting is one of “udder” confusion followed by a smoke and mirrors chess game with the livelihood of our minority farmer status. It smells similar to the rotting hay left in the field this summer.

The mantra of farmers needing to do more writing, organizing and telling our story seems like a broken record when the fox is in the hen house every night. Farmers and their wives are already pushed to the emotional and financial limit and now we must become unpaid lobbyists to boot for a food system that values bottled water and soda over wholesome dairy products. In the words of Forrest Gump, “That’s all I have to say about that.” Published 7/24/2009 in Lancaster Farming