Vt. dairy price plan gains support

Vt. dairy price plan gains support

	Published : Wed, 29 Aug 2007 18:59 By : Agencies Print this Story

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) - A plan by a group of Vermont dairy farmers to end steep swings in milk prices paid to farmers is gaining support around the country, organizers said.

Under it, farmers would pay 15 cents for every hundred pounds of milk they produce into a fund that would be used to market milk internationally and manage the milk supply, which is often blamed for broad price swings.

Last week, the California-based Milk Producers Council cooperative said it supported the plan in principle, according to Margaret Huessy-Laggis, of Hardwick, a member of Dairy Farmers Working Together, which is traveling the country seeking support.

'Most of the farmers who we have met with ... they never want to put their families through what they went through in 2006,' she said Tuesday.

Last year, milk prices plummeted to record lows, and farmers grappled with poor weather and high fuel and feed costs. To help farmers through the crisis, the state agreed to give them $8.6 million through milk check supplements.

Striving to include the price plan in the Farm Bill, the Vermont group has met with farmers and cooperatives in Florida and Wisconsin and will travel to Oregon next week to pitch the idea.

'My feeling is it will really start to snowball now,' said Huessy-Laggis. 'I think everybody is looking for a stabilized price,' she said.

A similar voluntary program in which farmers pay up to 10 cents per hundred pounds of milk has been successful, but the payment was too low to stabilize prices and only about 65 percent of the country's dairy farmers participate, Huessy-Laggis said.

The Vermont plan would be mandatory.

Both the Milk Producers Council of Chino, Calif., a cooperative representing more than 100 farmers, and Western United Dairymen, a trade organization in Modesto, Calif., representing 1,100 farmers, are awaiting a report on the proposal from a Cornell University agricultural economist. It's due this week.

'What we are supportive of is the concept of farmers working together to solve dairy issues,' said Ray Souza, president of Western United Dairymen.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., a member of the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, has said Wisconsin Sen. Herb Kohl is key to winning support in the Midwest.

'I'm pleased that Vermont producers continue to work with other regions. They are being constructive, and they are breaking new ground,' Leahy said. 'This new concept is promising, and I look forward to working with members from other regions who in the past have opposed dairy policies that work for Vermont and the Northeast.'

Kohl was not available for comment Tuesday, his press secretary said.