Having grown up on a dairy farm, spending countless hours milking cows, I was appalled when I heard about the "herd retirement" being done by CWT (Cooperatives Working Together). "The Herd Retirement Program reduces milk production by reducing the number of cows in the national dairy herd. This is done on a voluntary basis in which farmers wishing to get out of the dairy business bid to do so. If their bid is selected, their cows are permanently removed from milk production. CWT has executed six herd retirements since it began in 2003, removing a total of 276,000 cows that produced over five billion pounds of milk" (http://www.cwt.coop./about/about_whatis.html). CWT is part of an attempt to help create a more stable price for milk by decreasing milk supply, therefore increasing the demand, and subsequently, the price farmers receive for milk. However, according to a recent piece on National Public Radio, the price farmers are being paid for raw milk is currently at a 40 year low, making this slaughter of whole herds of milk cows, many in their prime, seem not only repulsive, but senseless and unjustified (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112002639). Part of CWT's seeming futility is due in part to the increasing use of sexed semen in the dairy industry, which is tipping the scale in favor of more milk cows on the market, not fewer.
Many of the very same producers who pay into CWT use sexed semen, also known as "gender enhanced semen." Sexed semen is a fairly new phenomenon that has emerged in the dairy industry in the past 10 years, allowing farmers to purchase, albeit at an elevated price with a lower conception rate, semen that produces 90% female offspring. The price difference between traditional semen and sexed semen continues to become more equal, and its use is on the increase, with technology improving its quality and affordability at an astonishing rate. Soon sexed semen with a lower percentage of female offspring, but still significantly higher than traditional semen (75% compared to 30%-40%), at both a comparable conception rate and price, will be on the market and readily available to dairy farmers.
Now, you may wonder, what does sexed semen have to do with herd retirement? Well, the simultaneous slaughter of mature cows and birth of new heifer calves to replace them hardly seems an intelligent endeavor: farmers who are both paying into CWT and using gender enhanced semen are canceling out the price stabilization efforts of the herd retirement project.* Not only that, but sexed semen is producing replacement cows at a greater rate than cows are being "retired," arguably contributing to not only the alarmingly low price of milk, but also to the reduced market value of replacement heifers, meaning dairy farmers are facing bottom-low prices on two fronts - the price they receive for raw milk and the price they receive for any extra cattle they might have sold for a profitable price in the past.
So the question begs to be asked "Why do we (dairy farmers) shoot ourselves in the foot?" Well, I posit, like many people who find themselves in an economically vulnerable situation, farmers tend to think about the short term: how to turn the greatest profit in the quickest time. Farmers tend to think with a "me" mentality instead of a "we" mentality (like most Americans for that matter - we are after all an individualistic society, not a collectivist society). In the past an excess of heifer calves was every farmer's dream; it meant enough replacements for cows lost due to old age, unexpected illness or injury, or those culled for personal reasons ( - I just didn't like that one!) and the ones that weren't needed as replacements were a valuable commodity to be sold for a noteworthy profit to help pay the bills or buy that new piece of equipment you had your eye on. Unfortunately that is hardly the case these days when the price difference of an extra heifer and a mature cow is so insignificant that farmers are selling cows they would have kept in the past simply because it makes more sense to keep the newer model than the older one that has a few more miles. So back to the point, the price of replacement heifers, like the current price of milk, does not (or just barely if you are an exceptional manager) cover operating costs and slaughtering more herds of productive milk cows is not going to change that if those cows that are taken off the market are quickly replaced by
new ones being brought into the world at an unnatural rate.
Returning to the previous theme, I bet you are wondering about my statement on the "we" vs "me" way of looking at the world, right? Well, I would like to suggest that perhaps, just perhaps, if farmers would think about how our individual pursuit for survival might affect the industry, and in return, each farmer, we would be better off. For example, sexed semen if only one farmer used it would mean he/she would have a valuable commodity that would be a significant benefit for his/her operation. However, when a notable number of farmers are using gender enhanced semen to the same ends, those ends are very different - the market, as sensitive as it is, tips in the favor of the middleman because now there are too many replacement heifers and too much milk, driving the price down to the point where it ceases to be a living wage for farmers. Farmers have fallen prey to the promise of abundant heifers and high milk prices - and now both milk and heifers are abundant, but prices are slim. Let's hope next time the industry puts the common good before individual greed.
If you would like to read some more on this topic, there is an interesting article in the Journal of Dairy Science on the impact of sexed semen on the dairy industry (http://jds.fass.org/cgi/reprint/91/2/847.pdf , J. Dairy Sci. 91:847–856 doi:10.3168/jds.2007-0536). The author is hopeful that the impact of gender enhanced semen will be temporary - let's hope he is right and that the market finds its balance before it is too late for many farmers to recover.
*It is my opinion that slaughtering whole herds of cows indiscriminately is a despicable act, regardless of its profitability.
