Senator Gillibrand says Dairy remains a priority as negotiations for 2023 Farm Bill near

Negotiations for the 2023 Farm Bill are drawing nearer and U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) says the dairy industry remains one of her top priorities.

“Dairy is New York’s primary agricultural product, but our outdated milk pricing system is doing substantial harm to the industry and our dairy farmers are struggling,” Gillibrand said.

“We have the unique opportunity with the upcoming Farm Bill to modernize our milk pricing system and let dairy farmers be key players in guiding this critical reform.”

The Farm Bill cycles through updates every five-years and focuses on aspects like food assistance programs.

Prior to the 2018 Farm Bill, Class I milk was calculated using the “higher of” Class III or Class IV price plus the applicable Class I differential, Gillibrand's office said.

This was changed in the most recent Farm Bill to an averaging method of Class III and Class IV plus $0.74. This change, compounded by government intervention in cheese markets as a result of the pandemic, has resulted in hundreds of millions of dollars in lost income for dairy farmers from May, 2019 through, April 2021.

Image via the office of U.S. Senator Kristen Gillibrand.