Ag Industry’s Turn to Grow?

Price Improves for Dairy Farmers;
Berry Growers Hope for Same

by Dave Brumbaugh

Nobody who’s been part of a farming operation or is familiar with the industry will claim it’s an easy way to make money. Farms, particularly dairies, are essentially 24/7 operations for their operators. They depend on their efficiency and the whims of weather affecting their yields, since they can’t affect the price of their products, which are set by national and international markets.

However, even for farmers who wouldn’t tell you they had a good year if they won a lottery, 2000 was a tough one in Whatcom County.

“We kind of weathered a bad year last year,” says Greg Ebe, president of the Whatcom County Agriculture Preservation Committee, which includes more than 200 farms in its membership. A wet, short growing season hampered many farmers, he adds.

“Another year like that and a lot of farmers will say there’s got to be something better to do; a lot won’t have any choice,” observes Henry Bierlink, Lynden-based executive director of the Washington Red Raspberry Commission.

However, even Job didn’t face tough times forever. Dairy farmers and raspberry growers, who dominate the county’s agriculture industry, may be on the verge of a turnaround. Milk prices have rebounded this year and the raspberry industry expresses cautious optimism that prices for its crop also will improve.

“Overall, this year looks a lot better,” Ebe remarks.

 

Still important

The county’s farms continue to consolidate, but they still produce nearly $300 million in agriculture products annually and provide close to 3,000 jobs. The WestFarm Foods powdered milk plant and milk-hauler Milky Way are two of Lynden’s largest employers. Farms also support a variety of businesses that offer equipment, feed, fertilizer, pesticides and other supplies, as well as testing and veterinary services.

The longtime king of ag in the county has been dairy farms. Although the number of dairy farms in the county has shrunk from 3,000 in 1950 to slightly more than 200 today, the number of their dairy cows since 1993 has remained steady — between 63,000 and 68,000 — in the past decade, according to the Washington Agricultural Statistics Service.

The benchmark price for milk from farms has risen this year from around $11 per 100 gallons to more than $14 per hundredweight.

“It’s come back strong to the point where dairying is profitable again,” Ebe says.

The increase in the farmgate milk price is tempered by the effect of rising electricity costs. Dairies require a significant amount of power for their milking parlors.

However, even the West Coast’s power crisis may have a silver lining. Farms in California, a major milk-producing state, are clamoring for higher prices to offset astronomical electricity increases there. They may have the clout to move farmgate milk prices up for the entire country.

The dairy industry also may have discovered a way to increase per-capita milk consumption, which peaked at 32 gallons per person in 1970 but had fallen by 1999 to less than 24 gallons per person. A test campaign that placed $1 bottles of chocolate-, strawberry- and coffee-flavored milk in school vending machines was very successful. The dairy industry now is attempting to persuade bottlers and schools nationwide to install similar machines.

 

Berry bad year

With about 6,000 crop-producing acres and about 100 farms, Whatcom County leads the country and is one of the top five areas in the world in raspberry production. Raspberry yields and quality were good last year, leading to a crop of more than 58.6 million pounds in the county.

But the supply of raspberries worldwide has overtaken demand. The statewide average of the price that growers received for their berries last year plummeted from 66 cents per pound in 1999 to 31 cents per pound last year. The price that farmers receive for berries used in juice — which accounts for all of the county’s largest growers — plunged to 23 cents per pound. Bierlink estimates that growers need 35-40 cents per pound to break even.

“Growing was great; price was just a disaster,” Bierlink sums up.

But optimism can be found even among raspberry growers. Cold-storage stocks of raspberries have declined, easing pressure on the supply side. Some winter damage locally probably will keep this year’s county crop from being a bumper one. Bierlink is optimistic about the potential for the industry’s new promotion program.

Also, the industry is preparing to make its case that Chile has illegally flooded this country with individually quick frozen (IQF) berries. Six of Whatcom County’s largest raspberry growers are able to process the higher-quality IQF berries. If the industry wins, higher prices likely would result.

The news is better for the county’s two other berries of significance: blueberries and strawberries.

Local blueberry growers enjoyed their second consecutive year of high quality and yield and solid prices. With nearly 500 harvested acres, the county led the state in blueberry production in 1998 and 1999 with more than 4 million pounds both years. Blueberries increasingly are praised for their beneficial health aspects — Martha Stewart recently touted them in her nationally syndicated column — and demand for there is rising in Japan and other Asian markets.

County strawberry growers experienced a so-so year in 2000, but their 400 acres still annually lead the state in production, also around 4 million pounds.

Agriculture in Whatcom County isn’t limited to milk and berries. Smith Gardens in Bellingham and the Van Wingerden family in the north county are major providers of bedding plants and poinsettias to area retailers. Seed potatoes, hay, mushrooms, green peas and silage corn all have niches here. Beef cattle and mink are among the animals raised commercially in the county.

 

Progress on issues

Some progress is being seen on agricultural issues affected by government regulations.

Ebe believes that legislation passed this spring to facilitate the transfer of water rights can solve a majority of the water-right problems in the county. Also, Whatcom County government soon will be seeking commissioners for water conservancy boards, which will have the authority to approve routine water-right transfers.

Farms still don’t know the size of buffer zones that will be required along streams running through them. A pilot project along Ten Mile Creek may provide evidence that they don’t have to be as large as some environmentalists and salmon advocates are seeking.