Frustrated dairy farmers may dump milk

BANGOR – For some farmers, the federal checks that began arriving this month to reimburse them for drought losses and crisis-level milk prices may be too little, too late. In September, a hundredweight of milk was getting $13.71. A year ago, it was at $18.81. For nearly a year, Maine’s dairy farmers have amassed expenses while struggling with the lowest milk prices in 20 years.

Frustrated by prices that are not enough for them to stay afloat, a group of farmers is planning to protest by dumping a tanker load of milk on the ground later this month. Egide Dostie said a tanker truck will be picking up 10 percent of each of about 15 farmers’ daily production and dumping it on the ground at Dostie’s Route 104 farm in Fairfield.

“If [these low prices] go on much longer, we’re not going to be able to operate,” said Dostie.

Dostie has been farming since 1972, has a milking herd of 280 cows and produces about 19,700 pounds of milk a year. He’s considered a large-scale dairy farmer by Maine standards.

Even though assistance has arrived, Dostie said it was not enough to make up for losses and some farmers may have been waiting for the first round of checks before giving up on dairy farming altogether.

“I’m hearing the rumors,” said William Moirs, Penobscot County director of the Farm Service Agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“They are under tremendous, serious financial pressure and I have heard that one or two have gone out. The checks may have been a shot in the arm which will allow some farmers to stagger on a little longer,” said Moirs.

When the price fluctuates, it is the farmer who feels the loss, not the consumers, processors or transporters.

Walt Whitcomb, an Farm Service Agency dairy specialist, said, “People are making money on milk right now. It just isn’t the farmers.”

“Nationally, there is a huge amount of milk out there while consumption is still low. There is a lot of anxiety out there. People are going to have to make some tough decisions,” said Whitcomb. “These farmers are at a crossroads.”

One of the federal programs for milk farmers is the Milk Income Loss Contract, which provides payments based on the price of milk and the weight produced. The MILC program was enacted to help stem milk-pricing woes after the expiration of the Northeast Dairy Compact last year. It was part of the 2002 Farm Bill.

“As of last Thursday, we have put out $3.4 million in milk payments,” said David Lavway, state Farm Service Agency director.

But, Lavway said, “For some farmers, it probably comes too late since they went so many months in a row without compact payments or MILC payments.” The MILC program ultimately will provide about $6 million to Maine’s dairy industry.

Dairy farmers in Maine have been getting $11 per hundredweight – the same price they received in 1976 – when it costs them $16 per hundredweight to produce milk. Although the Farm Bill was passed in May, no regulations or sign-up process had been implemented until late September.

That left farmers in the lurch for nearly a year, selling their milk at prices lower than production costs.

Lavway said no one really knows how many of Maine’s farmers are contemplating selling out. “Farmers tend to hang in there. They don’t want to get done,” he said.

Jon Olson of the Maine Farm Bureau said, “Not only are dairy farmers concerned, but also all the support industries, such as feed dealers, equipment sales.”

The dairy provisions set a minimum price floor for milk products, with assistance to farmers kicking in when fluid milk prices hit $16.94 per hundred pounds of milk. It was enacted to help offset the damage done to farmers with the failure to reauthorize the compact, a marketing agreement between farmers and processors that provided payments to balance the widely fluctuating milk market.