Lancaster Farm Bureau Bucks CWT Proposals
PARADISE (Lancaster Co.)
On June 3, the board of directors
of the Lancaster County Farm
Bureau-(LCFB) voted, without
dissent, to abstain from support
for the program called Coopera
tives Working Together (CWT)
as proposed by the National Milk
Producers Federation (NMPF)
headquartered in Arlington, Va.
The LCFB is taking a position
different from a recent 14-to-2
vote of the statewide Pennsylva
nia Farm Bureau board to sup
port CWT.
“Trying to raise prices by
limiting supply in an open mar
ketplace is foolish, ineffective,
and counterproductive, especially
as we look at the long run,” said
Don Ranck, board vice president
and policy development chair.
Ranck owns a small dairy and
large farm bed and breakfast in
Paradise.
“The CWT proposal is an at
tempt to create an illusion of
unity in trying to raise low farm
gate milk prices, when in reality
it has the potential to be the most
corrupt and divisive in the histo
ry of the organized dairy industry
in the U. 5.,” he warned.
“The CWT program is not an
idea that was tried in the debate
of policy development among
elected Farm Bureau members,
nor through elected cooperative
delegate review. It was hastily
contrived in a back room some
where, and is now being foisted
onto Farm Bureau members and
cooperative members in a top
down approach, very much coun
ter to die mission statements of
Farm Bureau and of most coop
eratives, so the serious flaws in it
were never worked out,” said
Ranck.
Others see serious problems.
It ' more advantageous to in-
vest in advertising and product
promotion than to try to limit
supply,” said A 1 Wanner, LCFB
board member and owner of a
400-cow dairy near Narvon.
Wanner prefers to see substantive
changes to the current CWT pro
gram, rather than have no pro
gram to enhance farmgate milk
prices. “But we also do not see
the USDA using the Dairy Ex
port Incentive Program to its
maximum allowable level, nor
adequate administration of the
new Milk Income Loss Contract
program,” Wanner noted.
Steve Hershey, Elizabethtown,
LCFB board president and owner
of family-operated herds of more
than 250 cows, noted that dairy
farmers who use the tools of con
tracting, forward pricing, or
hedging will be big losers if a pro
gram like CWT goes through.
“My family would stand to lose
up to $BOO per month in the next
year if the CWT program is im
plemented,” said Hershey. “Why
would we support a program that
works against the tools of mar
ketplace economics that we al
ready have?”
The NMPF board is scheduled
to meet in late June to decide
whether the CWT program has
the support of producers of at
least 80 percent of all milk pro
duction in the U.S. Chairman of
the NMPF board James P. (Tom)
Camerlo, owner of a 500-cow
dairy near Florence, Colo., also
recently elected chairman of the
board of Dairy Farmers of Amer
ica, by far the largest cooperative
in the U.S., is making the as
sumption that 80 percent is
needed to implement the pro
gram, according to Gordon Hoo
ver, NMPF board member and
owner of a 110-cow herd in Nar
von, neighbor to Wanner.
“ Hoover is on the road
promoting the program, trying to
drum up support, even though
there are serious misgivings
about the basic premises on
which it is built,” said Ranck.
“Hoover is also secretary of the
corporate board of Land O’Lakes
Cooperative, so it appears to
some that both he and Camerlo
have conflicts of interest.”
Ranck and Hoover are both
former presidents of the board of
LCFB, and both hold elected
leadership positions in the Land
O’Lakes Cooperative, which has
offices in Carlisle and in Minne
apolis, Minn. “We agree on the
vast majority of solutions to
problems, but on this issue we are
diametrically opposite,” said
Ranck.
There are others who are out
lining clear problems with the
CWT concept. Ken Bailey, Penn
State dairy economist (see his
column on page Al 6), posted to
his Website at http://
dairyoutlook.aers.psu.edu a bal
anced article showing why CWT
looks attractive at initial glance,
but he delivers a stinging crit
icism of the concept on which it
is based. “At first glance, it
sounds like a good plan,” said
Bailey.
“It will be viewed in Washing
ton circles as a self-help program
that won’t cost the U.S. Treasury
a dime,” he notes. “And dairy
producers who have been facing
low milk prices since nine-eleven
will be glad that something, any
thing, is being done.
“But we can’t have our cheese
and eat it, too,” he continued. We
must choose between government
price supports and Supply man
agement or marketplace econom
ics, ' ’t have it both
cr* c*’’ ■“"
12 Ways To
Income
George DeVault
Special To Lancaster Farming
By becoming a more aggres
sive, direct marketer, there is al
most no end to the ways you can
increase income from a dairy
farm. Here are just 12 ideas:
1. Get a raw milk license and
start selling milk directly.
2. Bag up manure and sell it
for garden fertilizer.
3. Solicit school tours of your
farm.
4. If you have a stocked pond,
open it for fee fishing. In winter,
rent it out for ice skating parties.
5. Plant a pumpkin patch on a
few conveniently located acres
this month. Come fall, you can
make money on pick-your-own
pumpkins.
6. Offer hayrides, especially
haunted hayrides in October.
This will compliment your
pumpkin patch and provide a
market for bundles of corn stalks
and other seasonal decorations.
7. Sell straw or spoiled hay for
garden mulch.
Bills
stacking
up?
It's been a rough year for the dairy industry and
you probably have more bills than you want to
think about. Mid Atlantic Farm Credit wants to
give you a different kind of bill-the kinds with
dead presidents on them.
In April 2003, we distributed over $17.9 million
to our borrowers. And that's just the latest in a
long history of success: since 1990, we've
returned more than $146 million in patronage
payments. What other bank can say that?
Patronage refunds. Just one more reason to
* cpme to Mid Atlantic.
A Mid Atlantic
Farm Credit
800.477.9947
mafc.com
Housing Lender
Lancaster Farming, Saturday, June 7, 2003-A27
Boost Dairy
This Year
8. Sell firewood.
9. Sell large rocks, even boul
ders to landscapers.
10. Offer freezer beef, pork, or
other meat products.
11. Add value to your milk by
turning it into yogurt, cheese,
cream, or ice cream.
12. Get certified as an organic
dairy to boost the value of what
you produce.
But how do you reach custom
ers to do any of this?
A good place to start is by par
ticipating in the open gate farm
tour that most county extension
offices sponsor each year. It will
bring hundreds, maybe even
thousands of customers out to
your farm for free.
You can also get free publicity
by getting the local newspaper or
TV station to do a feature story
on the changes you’re making.
Reporters are always looking for
a good good news story
about farmers.
It’s easier than you might
think. I’ll have much more about
that in future columns.
Oar
ie Crop
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