|
|
Article: Some dairy operations urged to pay into price pool
- Article from:
- AP Online
- Article date:
- April 6, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. (Hide copyright information)
|
A dispute over how milk processors and bottlers pay dairy farmers for their product is raising years-old arguments over who's playing fair.
At issue are funding pools the government set up decades ago to ensure farmers get a minimum price for their milk. Processors and bottlers pay into the pools, but farms that do everything from raising cows to bottling and selling their own milk don't pay in, under an exemption for so-called "producer-handlers."
The National Milk Producers Federation and the International Dairy Foods Association want to scrap that exemption. Together they represent about 36,000 of the nation's 60,000 commercial dairy farmers and about 220 ...