now operating at Chicago, St. Louis, 

 Champaign, Decatur, DeKalb, Gales- 

 burg, Lasalle, Peoria, Moline, and 

 Rockford were set up by the Illinois 

 Agricultural Association and backed 

 by the County Farm Bureaus. 



With few exceptions you will find 

 that the leadership heading up these 

 organizations was developed by the 

 Farm Bureau. 



Before the coming of the fluid milk 

 co-operatives there was comparatively 

 little premium paid over condensery 

 and butterfat prices. There was con- 

 stant complaint in some areas over 

 weights and tests. At Chicago, which 

 today has a 50c per cwt. premium over 

 the condensery price on 90% of base 

 milk, organization is easily worth 25c 

 per cwt. and more to dairy farmers. 

 The base price on Nov. 8, for example, 

 was about $1.90 when non-members in 

 the territory were getting $1.50. At 

 St. Louis and Rock Island where AAA 

 marketing agreements are in force — 

 which would not have been possible 

 were farmers not organized — milk 

 prices have been stabilized at a pre- 

 mium for Class I base fluid milk which 

 recognizes the extra effort and expense 

 involved in producing mUk under rigid 

 sanitary requirements. 



At the organized down-state markets 

 last year, exclusive of Springfield for 

 which no figures are available, sales 

 through co-operatives aggregated 168,- 

 304,083 pounds. Sales at St. Louis for 

 the year through Sanitary Milk Pro- 

 ducers totaled 449,182,342 pounds. And 

 the Pure Milk Association in Chicago 

 reported sales of approximately 1,740,- 

 000.000 pounds of base and surplus 

 milk last year at an average net price 

 to producer of about $1.65 per cwt. This 

 lattfer figure compares with the aver- 

 age condensery price for the year of 

 $1.15 to $1.20 per hundred pounds. 



More recently milk producers have 

 t-ither found it necessary or advisable 

 to go into the distributing business at 

 Peoria, Danville, Harrisburg, and Jack- 

 sonville. Peoria Producers Dairy will 

 market about 5,000,000 pounds this 

 year. The Producers Dairy of Danville 

 will handle about 2,500.000 pounds. 

 These co-operative dairies, together 

 with the one at Quincy. will handle an 

 estimated 13,250,000 pounds of milk 

 with a gross value of approximately 

 $2,640,000 in 1935. Last year this group 

 served nearly 48,000 producers. 



These co-operative milk producers 

 organizations, taken together, unques- 

 tionably are exerting a powerful in- 

 fluence, not only on the markets where 



Wilfred "Bill" Shaw, dairy marlietlng direc- 

 tor, is busy helping the milk producer co-oper- 

 atives with their problems. 



they operate but throughout the state, 

 toward getting their members a fair 

 price for milk, supply and demand con- 

 sidered. 



When you stop to consider that only 

 a 10 cent per cwt. increase returns 

 to the farmer on the 4,949,000,000 

 pounds of milk produced last year — a 

 figure approximating a half million 

 doUars^you get some idea of the vsdue 

 of milk producers' co-operation. 



But 10 cents a hundred is too con- 

 servative an estimate, even if you av- 

 erage it on all the milk produced in 

 the state. You get a better understand- 

 ing of the place co-operative associa- 

 tions are filling in this country by com- 

 paring prices at organized markets 

 with those at markets where producers 

 are unorganized. 



On some markets the effectiveness of 

 organized producers in maintaining 

 profitable prices has been hurt by ex- 

 tending the area from Avhich milk is 

 brought in. At Chicago there has been 

 a steady rise in surplus. There is con- 

 stant pressure from distant areas to 

 get in on the premium market. Thus 

 the interests of producers for the fluid 

 milk trade is closely allied with that 

 of farmers who sell to condenseries, 

 cheese factories and creameries. The 

 fact that the Chicago market main- 

 tained a relatively high price through 

 1932 and part of 1933 when condensery, 

 cheese factory and cream prices had 

 dropi)ed to very low levels brought a 

 flood of new milk to the city from the 

 hinterland. 



It is amazing when you consider the 

 proximity of Chicago to the cheaper 

 milk regions of Wisconsin, how well 



farmers in the Chicago milk shed have 

 maintained a base price substantially 

 above the condensery and cheese fac- 

 tory scale. 



The Illinois Agricultural Association 

 launched its cream marketing program 

 about 12 years ago. Cream pools or 

 produce marketing associations were 

 established to operate much like the 

 early milk producer associations. These 

 pools assembled cream, ran butterfat 

 tests and sold it on yearly contract to 

 the highest bidding private processors. 



Many of these cream pools were im- 

 mediately effective in reducing the 

 spread between cream station prices 

 and the Chicago butter market. A. D. 

 Lynch, dairy marketing director at 

 that time, tells a story about a meeting 

 in Ford county called to organize a 

 cream pool. There was a cream station 

 across the street from the hall in which 

 the meeting was held. On their way to 

 the meeting several producers noticed 

 the price posted on the window in front 

 of the station. The proprietor appar- 

 ently learned what was going on for 

 at the close of the session the old price 

 was erased and a new butterfat price 

 three cents higher posted. 



This incident is typical of the in- 

 fluence of local co-operatives in 

 strengthening country prices. Thus 

 co-operative marketing and co-oper-? 

 ative buying benefit not only members 

 who make it possible but all farmers 

 who market and buy the commodities 

 affected. 



According to Frank Gougler, direc- 

 tor of produce marketing, when the 

 Paxton cream pool started operating, 

 (Continued on page 14) 





*-. 



DECEMBER, 1935 



11 



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