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The price of milk for them is dropping while the price of milk in the stores has gone up. As predicted now, 25% of american dairy farms will go under despite there being a 5 billion pound shortfall of milk in this country. Right now that shortfall is being absorbed by imports from other countries.
On May 31st and June 1st many dairy farmers are planning on dumping their milk. Yep opening the tanks and watching it hit the ground. If the projected farmers do this who have pledged too so far, the supply of milk will be hugely impacted over the weekend in which is the weeks slowest time. This will be a reduction of 1% which sounds small, but is really huge overall.
As my farm family, dumping milk for these two days on all three farms would amount to about 11,000 gallons of milk. At a 1.52 per gallon, that is a sizable loss but at this point what can we do? We are losing 40K per week and the American Consumer is being fleeced as well.
Anyone else on here planning to join the dump milk campaign?
I think I'd rather sit out side of big chain stores and give it away. That would p**s them off... But I wish you the best....Family Farmers helped to build this country...
The only thing it accomplished was farmers having a smaller milk check in the month they dumped milk and lenders mad as hell at them cuz many were already in financial trouble.
What I'd like to see happen would be to have all the dairy farmers in a particular region like for example SW Wisconsin, get together and finance there own dairy processing company. Kind of like what the original coops were. Then market their products to the stores withing their region and surrounding regions.
If milk prices are still high in the stores, there's obviously a lot of markup being "skimmed" from farm to finished product.
With a little leadership, this could work.
This kind of operation would be workable, unlike anything like this for crop farming.
I think I'd rather sit out side of big chain stores and give it away. That would p**s them off... But I wish you the best....Family Farmers helped to build this country...
I like that idea. Kind of like the people that sit on the side of road and sell flowers of whatever. FREE MILK! (And then tell then in return, they should hassle whatever official people you need them to!).
Is there no way to donate (at least a small portion of it) to food pantries or the people that use the pantries? Not exactly the same, but last year when the lobstermen were getting such low dock prices, some were thinking of donating their catch to charitable places (such as pantries, or WIC recipients) rather than selling it, but I didn't see that happen, probably due to storage issues. (And can you imagine that leaking out on the AP- Maine Food Pantries Offering Fresh Live Lobster! Hahaha..)
How can the non-farming public help? Not buy milk? Buy more milk? Write to someone? Tell me, because I would like to do what I can.
The problem with giving it away could be health regulations with pasteurization and all. I know the government is funny about raw milk. Here in NW Ohio a group of farmers purchased a processing plant from a dairy that was sold to out of area investors. They have it up and running and are making some progress in getting out there. The interesting thing is, the largest regional chain grocer has their product in a couple of their stores, but are reluctant to put it in the others unless enough people request it. Now, how are the people going to know it is out there and whether they like it if the store doesn't make it available, at least on a trial basis.
The price of milk for them is dropping while the price of milk in the stores has gone up. As predicted now, 25% of american dairy farms will go under despite there being a 5 billion pound shortfall of milk in this country. Right now that shortfall is being absorbed by imports from other countries.
On May 31st and June 1st many dairy farmers are planning on dumping their milk. Yep opening the tanks and watching it hit the ground. If the projected farmers do this who have pledged too so far, the supply of milk will be hugely impacted over the weekend in which is the weeks slowest time. This will be a reduction of 1% which sounds small, but is really huge overall.
As my farm family, dumping milk for these two days on all three farms would amount to about 11,000 gallons of milk. At a 1.52 per gallon, that is a sizable loss but at this point what can we do? We are losing 40K per week and the American Consumer is being fleeced as well.
Anyone else on here planning to join the dump milk campaign?
When I was young, both my mother's side of the family in San Diego and Dad's back in Iowa were in the Dairy business. Working at the Dairy was my first job ever. There were'nt any routes available for home delivery so i went to work for a competitor of our family. Ah but we still got along.
I remember hearing the complaints about the U.S. government giving farmers all those subsidies. The fact is that those financial asistances and monies actually kept farmers going and prices cheap. I don't think the average U.S. citizen realizes how cheap that kept basic groceries down for it's people. Times have changed.
In California there is still no tax on most basic groceries unless things have changed since I left over 3 years ago. Over here in Sweden, they don't have things in any store packaged in any type of bulk size for it's consumers. Largest Milk you can buy is a one and a half liter carton. Swedish SALES TAX on everything, including basic food item groceries is 25%.
So I have no problem for government helping out and giving subsidies over there to keep farmers alive. What a waste all the big financial institution failure money is for criminal negligence in the Banking arena. At least some of that 800+ Billion should have gone to farmers.
BTW, anyone remember the old Divco Milk Trucks ??? Mine was a whole lot bigger than this one below. There's a lot of things about those days I miss. BTW, do they have any of those Dairy Store drive-thrus back in maine ??? My family had four. It was Rocky Home Dairy.
How can the non-farming public help? Not buy milk? Buy more milk? Write to someone? Tell me, because I would like to do what I can.
You can write to Susan Collins and Mike Michaud...both of whom have helped farmers in the past. Within state you can write John Piotti...he has incredible pull in our State Legislature.
Sorry, must have not been thinking this morning when I did the cwt conversion. $9 dollars per cwt amounts to .69 cents per gallon. $1.52 was what we were making this past fall. Last year we were making $2.07 per gallon.
So when you are in the store and buy a gallon of milk, realize this: the farmer gets .69 cents for that gallon, which includes labor, grain, diesel fuel, vet bills, taxes, land rental, and house hold expenses for working twice per day for 365 days a year. The creameries transport, process and bottle it for $3.01.
Bluntly, BT, I think that selling it on your own thru a co-operative effort is a lot better idea than dumping it. Don't get me wrong, I don't blame you for feeling the way that you do - but I just can't see a Maine Milk Party having any more effect than this past year's Tea Parties. The government pretty much figures that dairy farmers, cattle ranchers, and all other producers are on the hook now, between gubbermint subsidies and controls and the dairy conglomerates; so they figure if you dump the milk you will just lose money that you can't afford to lose, and end up being taken over by a corporate farming engine - which suits the suits perfectly.
I'd say that the only way to beat them at their own game is to do an end-run around them and form a co-op - an independent group.
I realize that you have little use for the niche market of whole raw milk; but World Foods is making a killing off of it and all of their 'organic' produce, especially their cheeses. Maybe it's time they had some competition from people who know how...
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Mine was a whole lot bigger than this one below. There's a lot of things about those days I miss. BTW, do they have any of those Dairy Store drive-thrus back in maine ??? My family had four. It was Rocky Home Dairy.
