The Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association's board of directors has approved concepts to improve and reform federal milk marketing order pricing provisions at a special meeting last week. The recommendations emerged from the ongoing work of the group's federal order reform committee, which was initiated in early 2021 to consider the future of the nation's government-legislated milk pricing and pooling system.
One of the recommendations include the adoption of dynamic make allowances for milk price formulas which incorporate regular cost of processing audits and current-cost price adjustors. They also call for USDA collaboration with industry to address the volatility between block cheddar and barrel cheese prices used to value protein in Class III milk.
"The inconsistent difference in these prices creates a cheese milk price that consistently punishes manufacturers who face the lower of these two price series," the WCMA said in a statement. "These two formats of cheese production--block and barrel--represent distinct businesses, including differences in production assets, different end uses and distinct groups of buyers."
The WCMA also wants to maintain depooling and repooling provisions found in individual orders, make permanent adoption of the Dairy Forward Pricing Program in the upcoming Farm Bill, and expand funding for staffing and services provided by USDA's Agricultural Marketing Service.
Meanwhile, the federal order reform committee encourages the dairy industry and USDA to embrace pre-hearing meetings and information sessions to build consensus and streamline a national federal order hearing process.
Categories: Wisconsin, Livestock, Dairy Cattle