By DOUG SCHMITZ
Iowa Correspondent

ANKENY, Iowa — Dairy groups are responding to what they are calling misleading reports of U.S. dairy farmers purposely slaughtering their cows to reduce the milk supply, with the Iowa State Dairy Assoc. (ISDA) being one of the first to speak out nationally.

While some dairy cows are being removed from the national dairy herd through herd retirement, Wayne Dykshorn, ISDA president and Ireton dairy farmer, said it is not an inhumane execution of animals.

“Instead, the cows are sent to market for beef and the dairy farmer is paid not only for the beef but also per hundredweight of milk production,” he said.

Media reports last month – and as early as February – claimed that U.S. dairy farmers are destroying cows on their farms in an effort to boost low milk prices and make a profit.

“The idea that a dairy farmer would euthanize a cow on the farm to decrease national milk supply is absurd,” said Dane Lang, Brooklyn, Iowa, dairy farmer. “The death of one cow out of the approximately nine million dairy cows in the U.S. would have absolutely no effect on the national milk price.”

The herd retirement program is part of Cooperatives Working Together (CWT), which was developed in 2003 by the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) and is a national, voluntary program designed by dairy farmers for dairy farmers. In fact, more than 225,000 cows are slaughtered each year through the CWT, with another 55,000 cows slaughtered outside the program, according to the USDA.

“It is designed to reduce milk production and increase demand for dairy products in order to provide income to dairy producers,” Lang said. “CWT reduces milk production by reducing the number of cows in the national dairy herd.

“CWT removes entire herds of dairy cows from production. If a dairy farmer chooses this route, the entire herd is sent to market. Farmers are losing money by producing milk because of the discrepancy between supply and demand.”

But in order for a dairy farmer to be profitable right now, Lang added that supply must be decreased or demand must be increased.

“Farmers who sign up for CWT are required to send their cows to market,” he said. “If farmers were allowed to buy CWT cows and milk them elsewhere, there would not be a reduction in milk supply. That is why CWT removes cows from production for good.”

Dykshorn said CWT herd retirement is available to dairy farmers that need to get out of the business, for one reason or another.
“Right now, with the devastating dairy economy, this is one option for dairy farmers who are facing the dilemma of losing more money than they are making,” he said.

Chris Galen, NMPF and CWT senior vice president of communications, said the national outcry from dairy groups about the media reports have been exaggerated.

 “This is much to do about nothing,” he said. “The AP story simply had an overly simplified headline – the story itself was accurate. Dairy farmers are increasingly culling their cows. They’re reducing their herd size, which everyone agrees needs to happen.

 “Strictly speaking, (the AP article is) accurate, although it’s not fully inclusive of what’s behind it.”

Like Lang, Kelli Boylen, director of the Northeast Iowa Dairy Foundation, said she was dismayed when she read The Associated Press story that appeared in several media outlets about dairy producers allegedly “killing their cows” to boost milk prices.
“This was all too good of an example of the public’s ignorance of general dairy farming practices, the respect farmers have for their animals and how milk is priced,” she said. “I was even more alarmed when I read the ‘reader comments’ on one television station’s website.

“There was some public outcry that the industry is supposedly ‘murdering’ cows, while other rejoiced because they believe that the killing of dairy cows would mean that the price they pay for a sirloin steak would go down.”

Boylen said she also thought the AP story belittled dairy farmers’ difficult decision to sell their herd or keep operating at a loss.
“Every farmer I know who has retired their herd to the CWT program faced this grave decision with a lot of emotion, and many still grieve the loss of their animals,” she said. “This headline, this article and the public’s response to it all show the great need to continually educate the public about who dairy farmers are, what they do, and why they do it.

“It seems like common sense that dairy farmers take great care of their animals so that they produce quality milk, but some sectors of the public continue to believe that they treat their cows poorly and that they would be willing to thoughtlessly kill the animals that they rely on for their livelihood.”