THE ••6 0"«S T°" 



/I 



"Our naif job it to Improve the Quality of llllnoii Poultry and Eggs," says Frank Gougler, left, and Jack Countiss. 



farmer more money through co-operative selling." 



"We can do It and get the 



Here's What We've Done 



About Helping Illinois Milk and Cream Producers Get 



Fair Prices 



EVERY now and then some one 

 comes along and jars your 

 thoughts and perhaps your equa- 

 nimity with a leading question. 



It was such a question that prompted 

 this story. The question is, "what has 

 the I. A. A. done to help itsTnembers 

 get a better price for their milk and 

 produce"? 



That's a large order. You have to 

 go back and look at the record of the 

 past 15 years to answer it. For 

 without such an analysis you can't 

 answer it. Nor can you answer it with- 

 out visualizing just how large the dairy 

 and produce business in this state 

 bulks, and what it means in dollars 

 and cents to the owners and operators 

 of some 200,000 Illinois farms where 

 cows are milked, poultry raised, and 

 eggs gathered daily. So let's have a 

 look. 



Illinois ranks fifth as a dairy state. 

 Last year, the census tells us, 1,130,000 

 cows were milked in this state. Their 

 total annual production was 4,949,000,- 



10 



000 pounds of milk and 188,000,000 

 pounds of butterfat. This is an average 

 of 4,380 pounds of milk and 166 pounds 

 of butterfat per cow. Not a high aver- 

 age but then last year was a year of 

 high priced feed and relatively un- 

 profitable production -in the dairy busi- 

 ness. 



The farm value of milk last year is 

 listed at $71,760,000. That's a good deal 

 of money. Cash income of dairy prod- 

 ucts sold was $58,263,000. Illinois 

 creamery butter production was 66,- 

 516,300 pounds. It required more than 

 53 million pounds of butterfat to make 

 that butter. What has the Association 

 done to improve the farmer's position 

 as a salesman of these products? 



Since 1921 the I. A. A. has had a 

 dairy department. And since 1921, I 

 believe without exception, have all the 

 successful milk bargaining and dis- 

 tributing organizations, and co-oper- 

 ative creameries been established in 

 this state. 



The work of organizing Illinois milk 



and butterfat for sale through producer 

 co-operatives was launched by tJie I. 

 A. A. under the assumption that farm- 

 ers are more likely to get a fair price 

 when they centralize control and sale 

 of their commodities. 



This isn't the only reason, however. 

 Quality improvement, checking of 

 weights and tests, and advertising to 

 stimulate consumption also loom large 

 in co-operative benefits and service. 



And so, systematically, the County 

 Farm Bureaus and the I. A. A., work- 

 ing hand in hand, began setting up 

 bargaining associations primarily to 

 sell the farmers' milk to the estab- 

 lished dealers at a justified premium 

 over butterfat and condensary prices. 

 At a few points, even as early as 1922 

 and 1923, County Farm bureaus or- 

 ganized co-operative distributing 

 plants. The Quincy co-operative is a 

 shining example of the fact that farm- 

 ers can succeed in the milk distribut- 

 ing business. Producers there consist- 

 ently have been netting more for their 

 milk than on other markets of similar 

 size. More recently Springfield. Peoria, 

 Jacksonville. Danville, and Harrisburg 

 have seen the establishment of co-op- 

 erative dairy distributing companies. 



But most of the milk co-operatives 

 established in Illinois are of the bar- 

 gaining type. In every case the fluid 

 milk co-operative sales organizations 



I. A. A. RECORD 



