Twenty-two farms kick off New York’s statewide Dairy Profit Team program

SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Twenty-two dairy farms across New York state will use teamwork to help improve finances, milk production and much more.

The farms are among the first in the state to sign up for a Dairy Profit Team, under a program by the NY Center for Dairy Excellence to establish 45 new teams this year.

Dairy Profit Teams are a group of advisers that help a farmer work through defined issues and opportunities on the farm, and develop strategies for change.

Team members

Team members are often agronomists, veterinarians, animal nutritionists, bankers and others. They may come from agribusiness, Cooperative Extension or elsewhere.

Team members offer solutions and suggestions. The farmer is ultimately responsible for farm management decisions.

Farmer-driven

The center, managed through the New York Farm Viability Institute, is a non profit group that brings together farmers and agricultural service people to jump-start programs that help dairy farmers improve profitability.

The center is expanding a pilot program funded by the New York Farm Viability Institute in late 2007 that launched 15 Dairy Profit Teams in Jefferson, Madison and Wyoming counties.

The first round of selected teams this year represents a diversity of farm practices, including grazers, organic, not organic, free stall housing, milk parlors, pipeline milking systems, robotics milking and more.

Some of the farms have already identified goals the teams will be working on, including increasing in milk production, developing a record keeping system for environmental practices, improving cow comfort, preparing the farm business for the next generation and more.

Cost share

The center received state funds to help establish 45 teams. Farms are eligible for cost share to provide stipends to team members and a group facilitator. Grant funds of $2,400 typically cover 80 percent of the farm’s costs to establish a team.

Applications are still being accepted, and can be printed from the NY Center for Dairy Excellence Web site, www.nycde.org.

Cautious optimism

On top of a general recession, New York’s dairy farmers are facing rising costs for items like fertilizer and animal feed at the same time farm-gate prices for milk are reaching historic lows.

This year some farmers have received less than $13 per hundredweight for their milk, far less than the cost to produce it.

For example, the Cornell University Dairy Farm Business Summary for 2007 found that New York’s average dairy farmer had a cost of production at $17.46 per hundredweight.

Following is a look at new Dairy Profit Teams:

– Number of new teams: 22

– Milking herd range: 38-1360

– Average size milking herd: 245

– Counties with new teams: Chautauqua, Clinton, Cortland, Delaware, Genesee, Lewis, Montgomery, Rensselaer, Saratoga, St. Lawrence, Seneca, Steuben, Washington, Wyoming.