Ag bill favors small dairy farmers
TEXT OF STORY
Steve Chiotakis: A $23 billion agriculture bill could soon be on its way to President Obama’s desk. Negotiators from the House and Senate have agreed to reconcile different versions of the bill — including a bailout for dairy farmers. Reporter Joel Rose has more.
Joel Rose: The $350 million in emergency funding is supposed to help dairy farmers who are getting squeezed by high costs and low prices.
Doug DiMento: Right now, milk prices are far below the cost of producing the milk. So the more milk a farmer is producing each month, the more money he’s losing.
Doug DiMento is a spokesman for Agri-Mark, a co-op that includes farmers from New England and New York. There had been some tension between big dairy farms in the west and smaller producers in the east and mid-west.
The compromise announced yesterday includes $290 million in direct aid, which favors small farmers. The bill also allocates $60 million to buy up surplus cheese, which should help all farmers by raising milk prices.
DiMento says the money is a welcome relief, but it won’t solve the industry’s problems.
DiMento: These are just short-term fixes, just short-term band-aids. It’s gonna take a long-term look at dairy policy — and really, the whole food policy here in the U.S.
DiMenton says the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which sets milk prices, needs to find a way of avoiding the boom and bust cycle of recent years.
I’m Joel Rose for Marketplace.
Stories You Might Like
There’s a lot happening in the world. Through it all, Marketplace is here for you.
You rely on Marketplace to break down the world’s events and tell you how it affects you in a fact-based, approachable way. We rely on your financial support to keep making that possible.
Your donation today powers the independent journalism that you rely on. For just $5/month, you can help sustain Marketplace so we can keep reporting on the things that matter to you.
