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E.Central MN | I was talking with a young dairy guy at my crop insurance meeting about how young people get can acquire land. He mentioned that his parents and most dairy farms have put their money in the cows and equipment to provide feed for the cows and he compared that to those farmers who just bought land to row crop it. The land prices have increased faster than their profits from milking cows. My point is that even though cattle are making money right now, over the longer term it hasn't kept pace with the profits from just buying land. We can blame the packers for taking advantage of captive beef supplies, etc which decreased the incentive to add cows when the beef supply in the US was shrinking, but overall its just one of many factors that have been pressuring the livestock industry to cut back. In order to change the trend its going to need higher profits for several years simply because other areas of ag are offering higher returns with less risk. In addition, govt regulation is making it more difficult every year for animal-based operations, especially in areas that receive numerous rainfall events. At some point livestock produce manure and because manure is spread or injected on land, rainfall often carries particulates to watersheds which the EPA is trying to eliminate. Since we can't regulate the rainfall there is no method that will satisfy the EPA except eliminating livestock, that is the trend that I see. | |
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I think we need to discuss why Cow numbers are low!
