HUDSONVILLE, MI (WHTC-AM/FM) – Uncertainty and confusion seem to be prevalent in all aspects of society in the wake of the COVID 19 outbreak, and the ag community is not immune.
The United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization said the world risks a “looming food crisis” unless measures are taken fast to protect the most vulnerable, keep global food supply chains alive and mitigate the pandemic’s impacts across the food system, but according to Diane Loew, a Hudsonville-area dairy farmer who is an author and blogger, she’s been getting mixed signals.
“A lot of … farmers have received letters from their co-op that are saying that they want us to cut back on our milk, on our cows, and to be prepared to dump milk if necessary,” the “Farm Wife” said during her biweekly feature on “WHTC Morning News.” “What’s so confusing is that we hear that from them, and then we hear from other people within the (dairy) industry that say, ‘No, you’re not going to need to do that, there are milk plants working around the clock, they can’t keep up.”
In noting a 27 percent drop in milk prices since January, Loew added that, “We were pretty fragile before all this started, (and) now that this has happened, it’s really more of an unknown than what it was before.”
