As more tariffs are added on U.S. goods, local farmers are struggling to keep their farms alive.
Dairy farmers across the nation are dealing with an oversupply of milk, declining dairy prices and low demand for exports going to Canada, Mexico, and China.
Steve Palladino, who has been in the agriculture business since he was little, was taught how to be a farmer by his grandfather who immigrated to the United States from Italy.
“This is something that I love, I have a real compassion for agriculture,” he says
Palladino, owner of Walnut Ridge Dairy Farm in Lansing, says that it’s hard to understand how the tariffs will benefit dairy farmers and others.
“We’ve just seen the negative impact and it’s not just been in dairy, you’re talking about the steel industry and construction,” he added.
Tariffs on corn and soybeans also affect farmers who use this in the feed they give their cattle.
“If tariffs are put onto those things and prices drop here, sure I may pay less for the price for them so the cost of producing milk might drop, but that cost would have to drop so significantly to basically cover what we lost due to the tariffs and the dairy end of things,” Palladino says.
Dean Norton, public policy director at the New York Corn and Soybean Association, explains how corn and soybeans are used on farms.
“Corn and soybeans are an integral part of livestock animals diet whether it is a dairy cow or beef animal. Livestock farmers supplement the feed that is fed to these animals with ground corn and soybeans. The importance has to do with providing the appropriate nutrition to these animals that allows them to grow and remain healthy,” he explains.
Dairy farmers in upstate New York and Wisconsin use to have the ability to ship ultra-filtered milk tariff free to Canada, but this stopped in 2017.
“What changed in 2017 was the Canadians changed how their milk was priced by adding a 7th pricing class. By making this change the milk that was being exported by the U.S. into Canada was now over-priced and the market has dried up” Norton says.
Now, tariffs are causing farmers to pinch their pennies. For Palladino, they have affected his sales, especially after investing in a new facility for Walnut Ridge Farm.
“I’ll tell you very honestly, we’re meeting with bankers every 3 or 4 months just to kind of look at what their projections are, ours are, the investment we put into this facility 3 years ago was significant and added to our cost and then prices have dropped,” he admits.
Norton believes if things continue the way they’re going, job losses will occur by farmers exiting the business, retirement, or sales.
“Will there be job losses? Yes. As the consolidation happens so too will employment opportunities on farms and with processors,” he says.
As for consumers, tariffs will minimally affect them.
“The consumer will not see any real change to what they see in the dairy and cheese aisles in the grocery store. Prices will also be fairly stable for the consumer,” Norton says.
But for Palladino, he cant sustain his business with current milk prices.
“For farming in general, agriculture in general, we really need to see a change quickly or we’re not going to be around.”