Tag: dairy farmer

Reaching Out: Dairy’s Voice Heard as Farm Bill Groundwork Laid

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

Highlights

  • Coordinated farmer appearances at numerous congressional policy panels
  • Placed farmer perspectives in mass-market media
  • Developed dairy’s next-generation leadership through timely webinars

Farm Bill hearings and listening sessions held by the House and Senate Agriculture Committees this spring and summer provided another opportunity for NMPF to proactively engage its members of all sizes, and across the country, to provide critical input to Congress as they prepare to craft a new farm bill next year.

NMPF recruited and worked closely with several farmer leaders, including Melvin Medeiros, a Dairy Farmers of America producer from California and NMPF Executive Committee member; Ashley Kennedy, a Michigan Milk Producers Association producer from Michigan; and Lolly Lesher, a DFA producer from Pennsylvania and NMPF Dairy Voice Network member on their testimony before Congress in favor of maintaining and strengthening the Dairy Margin Coverage program and providing additional resources to help farmers enhance their ongoing environmental stewardship efforts.

More informally, NMPF also worked with its member cooperatives to secure farmer participation at a variety of listening sessions held in the field. The events featured multiple members of NMPF’s farmer leadership, including Steve Schlangen, Chairman of Associated Milk Producers Inc. and an NMPF Executive Committee member from Minnesota; Joey Fernandes, a Land O’Lakes producer from California and NMPF board member; Jim Boyle, a United Dairymen of Arizona member from Arizona and Chairman of NMPF’s Immigration Task Force; and Medeiros. Other producer witnesses included Jeremy Visser, a Northwest Dairy Association/Darigold board member from Washington; Jim Werkhoven, an NDA/Darigold member from Washington and former NMPF board member; Charles Krause, a DFA member from Minnesota; and KC Graner, an LOL ag retail member-owner from Minnesota.

While NMPF-affiliated farmer participants hailed from different parts of the country, NMPF helped hone a cohesive message nationwide, focused on continuing and building on current dairy policy and making additional, needed investments in conservation, trade, and nutrition programs.

NMPF also communicated dairy’s policy message through targeted efforts to place farmers voices in mass-market media, allowing the industry’s best messengers to break through media noise. Brittany Nickerson-Thurlow, Medeiros, and Josh Gladden, all members of the NMPF Dairy Voice Network created last year, each bylined op-ed articles on dairy’s policy needs in daily newspapers in Florida, California and Arizona, resulting in follow-up interviews from the Wall Street Journal, BBC and other globally known outlets.

At the same time, NMPF communications staff helped develop and serve the next generation of dairy-farmer leadership through its Young Cooperators (YC) program. The YC Program is providing virtual and in-person educational and leadership development opportunities every month this year, covering a variety of topics of importance to young and beginning farmers including farm safety, employee onboarding, transition planning and consumer perspectives on dairy cattle welfare.

YCs also met this year in Washington, D.C. for the first time since 2019 for the program’s capstone Dairy Policy and Legislative Forum. 45 dairy farmers from 15 states and representing ten member cooperatives participated in the two-day event, which included discussions about political engagement and dairy policy issues, along with training on how to be an effective advocate and spokesperson for dairy. YCs then headed to Capitol Hill to speak with members of Congress and their staffs about NMPF priorities.

NMPF’s Bjerga on Dairy’s Commitment to Conservation

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga discusses on RFD-TV how a meeting with key lawmakers in Pennsylvania highlighted dairy’s conservation stewardship as Farm Bill discussions begin. Clint Burkholder, owner of Burk-Lea Farms in Chambersburg, PA, and a member of the Maryland & Virginia Milk Producers Cooperative Association, last Friday hosted several members of Congress, including Rep. Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-PA and top Republican on the House Agriculture Committee, as well as other area dairy farmers for a farm tour and roundtable discussion on the importance of agricultural conservation.

NMPF’s Bjerga on How DMC Fights Inflation

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga explains how the Dairy Margin Coverage Program helps protect farmers against rising feed-cost inflation by factoring in higher expenses even as milk prices reach records. Bjerga also talks about the potential market effects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and spells his last name for listeners in an interview with WEKZ radio, Janesville, Wisconsin.

NMPF’s Bjerga on Dairy’s Continued Consumer Strength

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

Despite the disruptions of the pandemic era, consumer dairy sales keep climbing, even after the turbulence of 2020 is taken into account, NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications Alan Bjerga says in an interview with RFD-TV. Butter, cheese and yogurt sales are all over 2019 levels, and even though fluid milk declined, whole milk — in other words, milk that tastes like milk — increased.

NMPF Leads Dairy in FMMO Discussion

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

 

NMPF President and CEO Jim Mulhern called for dairy farmers from all regions to work together for improvements to the Federal Milk Marketing Order system in his remarks at NMPF’s annual meeting in Las Vegas as shown on RFD-TV. Positive changes for dairy producers is possible through NMPF leadership because of the nature of the organization as an industry leader, said NMPF Senior Vice President of Communications, Alan Bjerga.

NMPF’s Mulhern Speaks at Annual Meeting

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

NMPF President and CEO Jim Mulhern speaks at the organization’s annual meeting in Las Vegas, NV on Nov. 16.

Ports Crisis Costing Dairy Farmers, NMPF’s Castaneda Says

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

U.S. dairy exports are being hindered by supply chain backups as U.S. ports, NMPF Executive Vice President Jaime Castaneda says in an interview on RFD-TV. “It is holding up the amount of product that we can export overseas, therefore that actually impacts the price of every single producer in the country,” Castaneda said.

NMPF’s Bjerga on COVID Community Corps

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

NMPF’s Senior Vice President for Communications, Alan Bjerga, discusses dairy’s leadership in getting farmers and farmworkers vaccinated against COVID-19, as well as NMPF’s membership in the federally led COVID Community Corps, in audio from an interview with RFD-TV.