Capital press. (Salem, OR) 19??-current, August 17, 2018, Page 9, Image 9

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    August 17, 2018
CapitalPress.com
Dairy
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Dairy
Markets
Lee Mielke
Dairy
markets
continue
upward
By LEE MIELKE
For the Capital Press
C
ash dairy prices
moved higher last
week as hot summer
weather and back-to-school
demand influenced the mar-
ket.
The Cheddar blocks
ended up at $1.6575 per
pound, up 7 cents on the
week but still 8 1/2-cents
below a year ago. The bar-
rels closed Friday at $1.62,
up 14 1/2-cents on the week
and 6 1/2-cents above a
year ago.
The blocks inched up
a quarter-cent Monday to
$1.66, highest price since
May 10, 2018, but gave
back a half-cent Tues-
day. The barrels were up
2 3/4-cents Monday and
another 2 1/4-cents Tues-
day, hitting $1.67, highest
since Nov. 22, 2017, and
1 1/2-cents above the
blocks, an inversion not
seen since Dec. 19, 2017.
Overall Midwest cheese
production is steady, accord-
ing to Dairy Market News.
Preseason football drives
Italian and pizza cheese
sales. Some manufacturers
have cut production by a
day or so a week. Some are
seeing lower milk supplies
as Class I demand gears up
for school openings. Spot
milk ranged 50 cents under
to $1 over class.
Western cheese output
remains active as milk yield
is mostly at normal lev-
els and sufficient to meet
cheese processing require-
ments. Cheese inventories
are plenteous but “overall,
the market undertone seems
to be firming,” according to
DMN. However, trade war
rhetoric with China heated
up again last week as the
game of chicken continues.
Cash butter closed Fri-
day at $2.34 per pound, up 2
cents but 34 1/4-cents below
a year ago.
The butter gained
2 3/4-cents Monday and
added 2 cents Tuesday, hit-
ting $2.3875, highest since
June 11, 2018.
DMN says butter output
is near its lowest point of the
year. Sales remain steady
to a bit slower but contacts
are confident in the market
direction, which has been
steady to slightly bullish all
year. School demand is in-
creasingly a market factor
helping sales.
9
Idaho dairy research
center gains traction
Fundraising for CAFE
begins in earnest
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
SUN VALLEY, Idaho —
The University of Idaho has
had to tweak its plans for
a world-class research and
teaching facility to address the
environmental and economic
sustainability of animal agri-
culture and food processing.
But the Center for Agri-
culture, Food and the Envi-
ronment — called CAFE for
short — will be one step clos-
er to fruition if the university
is successful in negotiating
a price for farmland that lies
within 50 miles of Twin Falls.
“I think we have the site,”
Michael Parrella, dean of the
university’s College of Ag-
ricultural and Life Sciences,
said during the Idaho Milk
Processors Association annu-
al meeting on Friday.
“If we can pull off this site
acquisition, we’ll see CAFE
on steroids” and things will
move forward quickly, he
said.
CAFE will be the largest
research dairy in the U.S. and
the only one addressing milk
production in an arid climate.
“It is phenomenally im-
portant,” he said.
Idaho’s milk and dairy
production is the third- or
fourth-largest in the U.S.
and is a force to be reckoned
Carol Ryan Dumas/Capital Press
Michael Parrella, dean of the University of Idaho College of Agricultural
and Life Sciences, gives an update Aug. 10 on efforts to establish a
world-class dairy research facility in south-central Idaho during the
Idaho Milk Processors Association annual conference in Sun Valley.
with. The research center will
address the impact of dairy,
focusing on environmental,
economic and social sustain-
ability of milk production and
food processing, he said.
Dairies, even large ones,
are not going to be able to
address these issues indi-
vidually. CAFE’s mission is
research, teaching and voca-
tional training and outreach
and extension, he said.
The university had decided
to purchase and retrofit an ex-
isting dairy with 1,000 acres
of associated cropland instead
of building from scratch. It
was looking for a dairy on
scale with Idaho’s industry —
about 2,000 cows — that is
highly visible and affordable
and has animal permits and
water rights, he said.
“That dairy doesn’t exist,”
he said.
The university also had
been looking for property in
Jerome County, with buy-in
from the county’s economic
development community, but
it couldn’t find anything. So
it started looking in surround-
ing counties, found a site that
would work for the research
farm and is now in negotia-
tions with the owners, he said.
The plan now is to have a
small on-site laboratory at the
outlying research farm with a
larger laboratory, outreach and
extension center and a dormi-
tory at the junction of Highway
93 and Interstate 84 in Jerome
County, which will provide vis-
ibility and public access.
SUN VALLEY, Idaho —
A revised plan by the Univer-
sity of Idaho to establish the
long-awaited Center for Ag-
riculture, Food and the Envi-
ronment — called CAFE —
should breathe new life into
fundraising efforts.
The state Legislature has
appropriated $10 million for
the $45 million project, and
the university has committed
$15 million. The remainder
needs to come from outside
sources. Several entities have
expressed interest, but solid
commitments have been elu-
sive.
That’s why Michael Par-
rella, dean of the university’s
College of Agricultural and
Life Sciences, took to the
road last spring to host lis-
tening sessions and inform
the public about CAFE’s
mission.
There just wasn’t enough
buzz about what CAFE is, he
said during the Idaho Milk
Processors Association annu-
al meeting on Friday.
The university set up a
foundation for fundraising,
but donations didn’t come
flowing in as abundantly as
officials had hoped.
“The problem was we did
not have a site,” Parrella said.
The university needed to
put a stick in the ground to
secure the necessary buy-in,
he said.
And that might happen
soon. The university is in ne-
gotiations for farmland with-
in 50 miles of Twin Falls, he
said.
If the site is secured, the
university is hoping the Leg-
islature will commit another
$5 million to the project. The
university is selling its Caine
Veterinary Teaching Center
in Caldwell and Boyer Av-
enue property in Sandpoint,
a site formerly used for re-
search and extension, to pro-
vide its $15 million share for
CAFE.
The project has received
a $2 million endowment
from the Idaho Wheat Com-
mission, a $30,000 dona-
tion from the Idaho Barley
Commission and a $15,000
pledge from dairy farmers
Don and Mary Johnson of
Kuna.
Simplot is also on board
with CAFE funding, and the
university has received ma-
jor scholarship funding from
Chobani for dairy students.
Parrella said he’s go-
ing to put out a fundraising
challenge to agricultural
commodity groups, whose
support would strengthen
the university’s request for
more funding from the Leg-
islature.
Committee tables vote on Yakima nitrate plan
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
YAKIMA, Wash. — A Ya-
kima County plan to address
nitrate pollution in the Lower
Yakima Valley has not been
adopted by the committee
that drafted it but will be re-
worked.
The Yakima County
Groundwater Advisory Com-
mittee — including 22 local,
state and federal governmen-
tal officials, agricultural and
environmental interests —
met Aug. 9 and tabled a vote
for adoption, said Rand El-
liott, a county commissioner
and committee chairman.
“I was hopeful that we
could have adopted the plan
but some changes were re-
quested so we are back to the
drawing board,” Elliott said.
Friends of Toppenish
Creek, a local environmental
group, and others request-
ed technical and substantive
changes, he said.
Staff will put the changes
in writing and the commit-
tee will meet in two to three
weeks to look at them, he
said.
Some involved nitrogen
availability reports and a re-
quest for more attention to
legacy nitrates, Elliott said.
The valley has been
farmed for more than 100
years with a lot of chemical
fertilizers applied in the last
60 years and without much
thought to application rates
in early years, he said.
“We’ve accumulated a
massive amount of nitrogen
and it will take a long time to
move that in the right direc-
tion,” Elliott said. “There are
a number of possible sourc-
es and a number of possible
solutions.”
The plan recommends lin-
ing dairy waste water lagoons,
extending municipal water
and sewer lines and increasing
regulations on irrigated farms
and dairies. An alternative is
the drilling of deeper commu-
nity wells in rural areas. The
plan has 65 recommendations
and is the result of six years of
debate and work by environ-
mental groups, dairies, farm-
ers, residents and government
officials.
The Washington Depart-
ment of Agriculture supports
the plan. Friends of Toppe-
nish Creek and others are
concerned the plan doesn’t
do enough to combat nitrate
contamination and relies on
voluntary compliance.
“The plan is making sug-
gestions to the county and
other regulatory agencies and
it is up to each of them to pur-
sue elements of the plan as
they see fit,” Elliott said.
After committee adoption
the next step would be a coun-
ty State Environmental Policy
Act review, then review by
the state Department of Ecol-
ogy, and the county adoption,
he said.
Testing between 1998 and
2008 found wells in the Low-
er Valley with nitrate levels
exceeding the federal safe
limit of 10 parts per million.
An EPA study concluded
five Sunnyside area dairies
contributed to excessive ni-
trate levels in domestic wells.
The dairies were sued by
the local conservation group
CARE and entered into a fed-
eral consent order to make
change their operations to re-
duce nitrates and provide resi-
dents with bottled water.
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