Prairie Farms plant closure puts local dairy farm at risk

Independent dairy farmer Karen Huffman has soured on Prairie Farms after the farmers-owned cooperative has quit taking her milk.

Huffman�s farm off Cape Girardeau County Road 620, east of Interstate 55, has been in operation for decades. It once was owned by the uncle of her late husband, Ron Huffman, who later purchased the farm and operated Midway Dairy Farms until his death in November.

The farm�s milk used to be sold to a Prairie Farms processing plant 80 miles away in Fulton, Kentucky. But Prairie Farms announced early this month in a letter to Kentucky�s state workforce and employment services division it will close the processing plant at the end of June, eliminating 52 jobs.

Huffman said Friday she learned just a few days ago from the driver who transports her milk Prairie Farms would stop taking her milk at the Fulton plant, effective immediately.

�We didn�t get any notice,� she said as she stood in her dairy barn, watching her cows.

A dairy cow at local dairy farmer Karen Huffman's farm eats hay Friday in Cape Girardeau.KASSI JACKSON ~ kjackson@semissourian.com

�We never dreamed of that plant closing,� she said.

Now her milk has to be hauled to a processing plant in Memphis, Tennessee. It is a much longer trip, which adds to the hauling cost she has to pay, Huffman said.

Huffman has started selling her milk through Dairy Farmers of America (DFA), another dairy cooperative. But as an independent producer, Huffman said there is no guarantee DFA will continue doing business with her.

Huffman said she inquired about joining Prairie Farms, but was told the cooperative is not accepting new members. Prairie Farms comprises more than 900 farm families throughout the Midwest, according to the cooperative�s website.

Prairie Farms vice president of marketing and communications Rebecca Leinenbach said the cooperative �has not taken on new members for several years.�

Karen Huffman lets a group of dairy cows return to the pasture after their milking on Huffman's farm Friday in Cape Girardeau.KASSI JACKSON ~ kjackson@semissourian.com

But she added �our farmer-owners have close relationships and share a common bond with other dairy farmers in their communities.� She said they �are sensitive to the difficulties fellow dairymen are facing.�

Huffman now has now applied for membership with DFA, which involves more than 15,000 farmer-owners across the nation.

That decision will be up to the DFA�s board of directors and could determine �if I stay in business or not,� she said.

The dairy business is hard right now, she said.

�Milk prices are at an all-time low,� Huffman said.

Dairy cows wait to be milked Friday at Karen Huffman's farm in Cape Girardeau.KASSI JACKSON ~ kjackson@semissourian.com

Huffman said she is paid $13.58 per 100 pounds of milk right now. When expenses are factored in, Huffman said the profit is small.

�We are barely getting by,� she said. �It has been rough.�

Huffman said her farm milks 160 cows. She used to have more, but the challenging dairy economy has led her to sell off some of her herd. �We�ve been selling quite a bit.�

Still, she said she doesn�t want to get out of the dairy business where the cows have to be milked seven days a week. About 15,000 pounds of milk are hauled away from her farm every other day, she said.

Joe Horner, an agriculture economist with the University of Missouri�s Extension Service in Columbia, Missouri, said 85 percent of milk in the United States is handled through cooperatives.

Most of the dairy farmers in the Cape Girardeau area are affiliated with Prairie Farms, he said.

In the spring, he said, there typically is a surplus of milk, driving down prices. Demand for milk rises again in the fall when school is in session, he said.

Cooperatives don�t want to take on new members and add to the milk supply when there is not the market for it, Horner said.

Older bottling plants are being shut down because it is more cost effective to expand a few plants than update all the processing plants to meet government regulations, Horner said.

Independent dairy farmers can find it difficult to find markets for their milk, he said, adding �access to markets is the critical thing in all of agriculture.�

For now, Huffman is taking it one day at a time and hoping she doesn�t have to send her cows to slaughter.

mbliss@semissourian.com

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