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Dairy Farm Crisis Hearing

Sally Fallon-Morrell, President of the Weston A. Price Foundation and RealMilk.com spoke about the benefits of Raw Milk.

Jonathan Haar, Dairy Farmer from New York, spoke about the Moo-nopoly that has been created by the Cooperatives and how they are not looking out for the best interest of their dairy farmer members

Sjana Mc lure-Berry, Organic Grain Farmer from New York, spoke about credit issues that our family farmers are facing.

Niaz Dorry, Executive Director of the National Family Farm Coalition, stopped by on her America the Bountiful Tour where she has been traveling across the United States visit rural towns and family farmers. She gave an update as to what she had seen in her more that 12,000 miles of travels. This hearing would not have come about if we wouldn't have scheduled her to appear.

ACTION ALERT

ATTENTION! ATTENTION! ATTENTION!

Citizens Take Action to Hold EMERGENCY Public "Hearing" into Dairy Farmers' Financial Crisis!

"We Must Do What the Government Refuses to Do to Take Back Control of Our Milk Supply!"

Attached is information about the Farm Women United (FWU) "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" scheduled for July 24, 2018, at the Lairdsville Volunteer Fire Hall, 

in Lairdsviile, PA, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

For more information, contact FWU at (570) 267-7405, farmwomenunited@gmail.com, P.O. Box 113, Laceyville, PA 18623 or check out the “Hearing” information on our website www.farmwomenunited.org under the heading “Dairy Farm Crisis Hearing.”

Please copy and circulate this FWU information widely. Send the Press Release to your media outlets. Drop off copies of the attached information at dairy farms, rural businesses, ag/farm/dairy co-operative events, farm and dairy association meetings, county and state fairs, farm shows, ag colleges and universities, churches, stores, local government offices, wherever people need to know what the Washington politicians are doing to our remaining dairy farmers and our local milk supply as they subject us to global "free trade" dairy policies to the detriment of our own dairy farmers. 

Consider participating in this "Hearing" by attending and/or by submitting extensive testimony or a shorter statement about your experience or perspective on the dairy crisis, or even a simple letter of support for dairy farmers that will be entered into the formal record at this "Hearing" to document the extensive information that Congress itself should be gathering but refuses to do so in what is the most outrageous and blatant example of dereliction of duty by federal legislators in modern American agricultural history that is patently undermining the Constitutional rights of American family dairy farmers.

It is the hope of Farm Women United that the FWU's Lairdsville "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" will be used as a model for more "Hearings" like it to be organized across the countryside by citizens themselves, including dairy farmers, farm/food advocacy associations, rural businesses, consumers, and other concerned citizens, who have had enough of powerful globalized Washington politicians controlling the direction of our farm and food policies by dictating how our farmers are being treated, what they get paid for their milk, how and where our food is produced, and what we are to eat. 

As the economic "Dairy Depression" worsens,

federal anti-farmer dairy policies continue to be implemented through the current Farm Bill process by the federal authorities who have full power to intervene in this humanitarian crisis and aid dairy farming families yet steadfastly refuse to confront this disaster of their own making. Dairy farmers and the rural communities that depend on them have faced socio-economic conditions that worsen with the passage of each "Farm Bill." The recent disgraceful House and Senate versions of the 2018 Farm Bill indicate that Washington politicians have no intention of stopping the historic financial crisis they have unleashed on dairy farmers as they push implementation of the final phase of the corporate global take-over of milk production. 

Dairy farmers can endure no more. They need direct emergency assistance by the federal government that controls all aspects of the policies causing these sufferings on our dairy farms. Congress and the present Administration refuse to provide any intervention in spite of months of pleas for IMMEDIATE action by supporters of Pro Ag's effort to implement a $20/cwt. EMERGENCY Floor Price under milk used for manufacturing with mandatory federal hearings to determine the systemic causes for this dairy farmer economic holocaust and what must be done for long-term remedies.

Since elected officials are ignoring our dairy farmers in need and stubbornly refuse to hold public interest hearings for the common good and since the dire plight facing America’s dairy farmers is worsening by the day, FWU is doing for our CITIZENS what Government authorities refuse to do by sponsoring this "Hearing" to give dairy farmers, rural businesses, consumers, and anyone concerned about the scandalous way dairy farmers are being treated by federal legislators an opportunity to speak up and be heard in a formal public forum to protest the deterioration of our dairy farming communities while politicians in both parties resist addressing the scandalous milk price dairy farmers have been paid, particularly bad over the past 3 1/2 years.

The unprecedented suffering, being experienced in all dairy farming communities, can no longer be ignored by anyone who has a conscience, as the federal government sits on its butt, allowing horrible federal milk pricing policies to push more dairy farmers into despair and bankruptcy, with the loss of their dairy farms inevitable as the financial bloodbath and despondency multiply across the rural business communities.

CAN WE COUNT ON YOU TO HELP US PROMOTE THIS FWU "HEARING" ON BEHALF OF DAIRY FARMERS EVERYWHERE? 

PLEASE START ORGANIZING A SIMILAR "HEARING" IN YOUR OWN COMMUNITY TO SAVE OUR DAIRY FARMERS, THEIR VITAL RURAL COMMUNITIES, AND OUR NATIONS' LOCAL MILK SUPPLIES!

ATTENTION DAIRY FARMERS, 

RURAL BUSINESSES, AND CONSUMERS!!

FARM WOMEN UNITED

Sponsors

“DAIRY FARM FAMILY 

CRISIS HEARING”

Tuesday, July 24, 2018

9 am to 5 pm

Lairdsville Fire Hall

143 School Lane, Lairdsville, PA 17742

For decades Federal and State Government officials have failed dairy farm families at all levels. 90% of our dairy farmers have been eliminated in the past 50 years by Federal Dairy and "Free Trade" policies that have put local family dairy farmers at an economic disadvantage, leaving our rural communities in shambles with a collapsed dairy farming infrastructure and our local milk and food supply in jeopardy. 

FWU is sponsoring this public hearing to give afflicted dairy farmers, impacted members of the rural business community, and beleaguered consumers an opportunity to speak out about the long history of the dairy farmers' economic crisis, the current desperate situation playing out right now on dairy farms and in rural communities across America, and the long-term dairy policy changes that must occur if family dairy farmers are to stay on their farms to produce fresh, local milk for consumers and to support a vibrant, local rural economy.

Guest Speakers, presentations, and opportunities to be heard and pick up information will be available from 9 am to 5 pm. (Lunch will be available to purchase.) 

To participate or for more information

Call FWU at (570) 267-7405.

Background For Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing

Backgrounder for Farm Women United “Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing”

July 3, 2018

Dear Dairy Farmers, Members of the Rural Business Community, Consumers, Political Leaders, and All Who Are Concerned about the Future of America’s Family Dairy Farmers under the Current Adverse Federal Government Dairy Policies:

             Farm Women United (FWU) has scheduled a "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" for the public, at the Lairdsville Volunteer Fire Department, Lairdsville, PA, on July 24, 2018, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in an effort to help identify causes of and solutions for the current financial crisis overwhelming local dairy farmers everywhere. The "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" will allow dairy farmers, rural businesses, consumers, invited speakers, and other interested parties to address the worsening economic crisis on dairy farms that is threatening the survival of the few remaining local dairy farmers and rural businesses along with a fresh, local milk supply for consumers.        

              Federal and State government officials have failed dairy farm families for decades, as evidenced by the accelerating loss of dairy farms throughout the countryside, while more farmers must sell-out because milk prices, controlled and determined by the federal government, are so far below "cost of production" (COP). With deep financial losses in each milk check, farmers cannot hold onto dairy farms that have often been in their families for generations. With the loss of each dairy farm, the rural community suffers as the economic lifeblood is drained from local businesses and towns that cannot survive unless farmers receive an adequate price for their milk. Consumers also lose because the disappearance of community dairy farms deprives them of the best possible source for fresh, local milk and dairy products. Reckless federal dairy policies, driven by irresponsible global "Free Trade Agreements," force consumers to increasingly depend on highly processed milk transported from huge "special interest" expansion farms often located thousands of miles from the consumers' table, a direct threat to national food security.

            Constant pleas from dairy farmers for assistance, intervention, and remedy have fallen on deaf ears in Washington, D.C., and in the Capper-Volstead dairy co-operative boardrooms in what amounts to an unprecedented abdication of duty by all those holding positions of authority over the well-being of dairy farmers. 90% of our dairy farmers have already been eliminated due to unjust federal dairy policies with the accompanying massive socio-economic losses still surging through rural communities from the low milk prices. 

           Local government officials are seeing firsthand, up close, in their communities, the consequences of bad federal dairy policies playing out at what has become ground zero for an agenda that forces global dairy policies onto local citizens, removing the power of self-determination from American citizens in matters of their food supply, collapsing the local dairy farming rural infrastructure at all levels in the process.

            In 2015 alone, dairy farmers lost approximately $20 billion in income, when Congress approved and passed and President Obama signed the notorious anti-dairy farmer 2014 "Farm Bill," according to testimony presented to the House Ag Committee, on May 24, 2016, by National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF). These staggering dairy farmer financial losses remain, not improving at all over the last 3 1/2 years, and continue to soak the rural economy with red ink, wreaking astronomical socio-economic havoc on the very communities consumers depend on for fresh, local milk, cheese, and dairy products, while Congress does absolutely NOTHING to rectify these glaring economic injustices carried out against dairy farmers. House Ag Committee Chairman Mike Conaway has made no secret of the fact that farmers are now facing the "worst economic downturn since the 'Great Depression'" yet he fails to lead this nation to embrace the long-overdue solutions to correct the federal government's abuse of dairy farmers that cries to heaven for remedy. 

            One of the most frightening symptoms of this accelerating dairy farmer crisis is the deepening desperation and despair driving dairy farmers over the mental health cliff with an increased risk for suicide prompting the dairy co-op Agri-Mark to include a letter with their milk checks advising farmers to call suicide hot-lines if they cannot handle the stress from the low milk prices. 

           Is this really the best we can do for this nation's hard-working family dairy farmers who have been abandoned and disenfranchised by their own government? 

            Now another anti-dairy farmer "Farm Bill" looms while members of Congress and the Trump Administration screw around and ignore the obvious critical need for an IMMEDIATE EMERGENCY INTERVENTION to stabilize the farmers' milk price so federal hearings can be held to investigate the causes and corrections for these deplorable milk prices that are driving dairy farmer economic and mental depression. 

            Since the federal government, at all levels, refuses to do its duty to assist dairy farmers in crisis, Farm Women United (FWU) is sponsoring the “Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" to give afflicted dairy farmers, impacted members of the rural business community, beleaguered consumers, and others concerned about the direction of this nation's dairy policies an opportunity to speak out and let their voices be heard at this public forum. USDA, FDA, Congress, the House and Senate Agriculture Committees flat out refuse to correct the glaring inequities institutionalized and codified against dairy farmers in current federal dairy policies while they surrender the sovereign local food supply of this nation to massive, corporate, global, business empires far removed from those who must eat but have few choices remaining about what they eat.

            Dairy farmers, members of businesses, consumers, and all interested parties who wish to speak and be heard and go on record supporting reform of current federal dairy policies to finally allow dairy farmers to be paid a fair price for their milk to cover what it costs to produce are encouraged to attend FWU's "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" and learn about the long history of the dairy farmers' economic crisis, the current desperate situation playing out right now on dairy farms and in rural communities across the US, and the long-term dairy policy changes that must occur if farmers are to have a brighter future with their Constitutional rights protected so they can stay on local dairy farms in strong and vibrant rural communities for the benefit of consumers.

           Themes that will be covered during the Hearing include the following relevant issues:

  • Unfair and unpatriotic "Free Trade Agreements" negotiated in secret have put US dairy farmers at a disadvantage with the domestic price of farm milk pushed so far below American farmers' "cost of production" (COP) that farmers have been losing their dairy farms for decades, now at an accelerated rate. The number of functioning local dairy farms has been reduced to such a low level that the rural dairy economy has collapsed. The situation is so bad that Ellsworth Cooperative Creamery, operating in Wisconsin and Minnesota, has just issued a plea for political intervention on behalf of its dairy farmers.
  • Unjust federal minimum milk prices are paid to dairy farmers under a complicated, bizarre "federal minimum milk pricing formula," after Capper-Volstead dairy co-ops "block-voted" Congressionally approved "Federal Order Reform" component milk pricing in 2000, with no way for farmers to recover what it costs to produce milk on the farm yet obligating farmers to give up around $2 per hundredweight (cwt.) to cover cost of production "make allowances" for dairy industry processors along with many other harmful surcharges that further reduce the money in farmers' milk checks
  • Huge displacement of farmers' milk at dairy processing plants by untested, industrialized, milk-derivative protein "moo-glue" MPC's and "ultra-filtered milk" etc., leaves farmers accused of "overproducing" milk to justify milk buyers' underpaying farmers for their milk while the US actually has a serious milk deficit hitting many regions throughout the nation. 
  • Milk market consolidation by the Capper-Volstead dairy co-operatives has left farmers with few if any "alternative" competitive markets for their milk, resulting in virtual monopoly and monopsony milk markets dominated by milk cartel conditions with power and services controlled by the co-ops that need to be investigated immediately for obvious violations of the Sherman and Clayton Antitrust Acts, et al.

            All are welcome and encouraged to attend this important event and listen to the presentations that will run throughout the day or to submit formal written testimony, statements, or letters about the effect this crisis has had on dairy farmers, rural businesses, or consumers for the public record that FWU will preserve as documentation to further address this scandalous family dairy farming crisis caused by the federal government and the Capper-Volstead dairy co-operatives. 

            A petition of support for emergency intervention on behalf of the dairy farmers will be available for signatures. The FWU petition supports Pro Ag's recommendation for a federal EMERGENCY $20 per hundredweight (cwt.) FLOOR PRICE under milk used for manufacturing along with mandatory federal hearings to identify the systemic causes of this farmer milk pricing crisis and the necessary long-term solutions. 

            Another petition will also be available for signatures to support making whole milk and full-fat milk available in the school lunch program for the health of the students, as recommended by Nina Teicholz in her well-researched book, The Big Fat Surprise.

             The FWU “Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" will be held on July 24, 2018, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Lairdsville Volunteer Fire Department, 143 School Lane, Lairdsville, PA 17742. Lunch will be available to purchase. 

              Please contact Tina Carlin at (570) 267-7405 for further information about the Hearing, or about how to present formal testimony at the event, or submit written statements or letters, for inclusion in the official record that will be used to advance public interest solutions for the common good so family dairy farmers will never again face such un-Constitutional inequities in federal dairy "policies" and so consumers can, once again, rely on fresh, healthy local milk supplies produced in their own vibrant rural communities.

Sincerely,

Tina Carlin

Executive Director

Farm Women United

P.O. Box 113

Laceyville, PA 18623

Donations to help support the Hearing

Farm Women United

DAIRY FARM FAMILY CRISIS HEARING

Sponsorship Donation Form

 Farm Women United (FWU) has scheduled a "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" for the public, at the Lairdsville Volunteer Fire Department, Lairdsville, PA, on July 24, 2018, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., in an effort to help identify causes of and solutions for the current financial crisis overwhelming local dairy farmers everywhere. The "Dairy Farm Family Crisis Hearing" will allow dairy farmers, rural businesses, consumers, invited speakers, and other interested parties to address the worsening economic crisis on dairy farms that is threatening the survival of the few remaining local dairy farmers and rural businesses along with a fresh, local milk supply for consumers.    

FWU is sponsoring this public hearing to give afflicted dairy farmers, impacted members of the rural business community, and beleaguered consumers an opportunity to speak out about the long history of the dairy farmers' economic crisis, the current desperate situation playing out right now on dairy farms and in rural communities across America, and the long-term dairy policy changes that must occur if family dairy farmers are to stay on their farms to produce fresh, local milk for consumers and to support a vibrant, local rural economy.

We are seeking donations to cover the expenses that we will have for the “Hearing.” These donations are not tax deductible as a contribution but could be an advertising expense as we will print your Business name and contact information on the back of the program to let the attendees know that you helped to sponsor this hearing.

If you feel led to donate sponsorship for this hearing, please include a business card or fill out the form below and mail, to:

Farm Women United, P.O. Box 113, Laceyville, PA 18623 or click on the following link to print the form. Donation Form

Name: _________________________________________________________________

Address: _______________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________

Phone Number: __________________________________________________________

Email address: ___________________________________________________________

Website: ________________________________________________________________

“Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.” James 5:4

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