HOW WE SEE IT: Cash For Cows

When you pour the milk to go with the cookies that you’ll leave out for Santa tonight, remember the hard work that went into producing that moo juice.

The past couple of years have been sour for America’s dairy farmers. A drop in global and national demand for dairy products has sent the price of milk plummeting.

While it costs about $18 per hundredweight (the industry term for 100 pounds) to produce it, milk is selling for far less than that - only about $14 now. Every carton of milk we buy at the store represents a loss for the dairy industry.

Not surprisingly, dairy farmers are quitting the business, and that’s certainly true here in Arkansas. Only 25 years ago, we counted more than 2,000 dairy farms in the Natural State; now we have 133. Still, the dairy industryaccounts for an economic impact of more than $600 million on Arkansas, said Jodie Pennington, dairy specialist for the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service.

This issue is of special interest to us. Though people generally associate Northwest Arkansas with Wal-Mart and chicken, Benton and Washington counties are the top two milk-producing counties in the state. It came as no shock that this year’s award for Arkansas farm family of the year went to Bill and Delia Haak, who are dairy farmers in Gentry. Yes, dairy is important in these parts.

Even those of us who don’t drink a lot of milk still enjoy things such as ice cream, yogurt and butter that we couldn’t get without cows. We can’t forget that dairy products are essential to the growth of young children.

If local farms disappeared, Arkansans would have to rely on milk trucked in from out of state. That milk would not be as fresh, and it undoubtedly would cost more.

With all of this in mind, it pleases us to know that our local dairy farmers are getting a share of the $290 million in stimulus money that was approved as part of the 2010 Agricultural Appropriations Bill, signed into law in October. Their checks were supposed to arrive today.

This is on top of money that Gov. Mike Beebe set aside earlier this year to stabilize milk prices.

The word “bailout” could be applied here, but somehow we don’t feel as bad about lending a hand to local farmers as we do to, say, banks and auto companies. It could be that we know how hard they work to support themselves and their families. Their jobs begin before dawn and last into the evening. They can’t call in sick. And let’s face it: It’s a dirty job that many of us would rather leave to someone else.

Also, however, we have to consider the cost of not propping up the dairy industry. In the long run, letting dairies go on their own might take a serious toll on our pocketbooks.

As for 2010, let’s hope for a significant increase in the demand for milk. That would be the best present of all for our farmers.