, 1924-04-02

A system of payment has been
worked out by Means of freight diff
ferential by which the lnner-belt milk
producers forfeit a small fraction of
their market price, which is added
to the lower price of the producers
product in the outlying districts. So
in the East as in the West we find
the fluid milk man paying n premium
to keep lower priced products off his
market. The Dairymen's league plan
has been in operation only three years,
but during the past year the league
operated 123 manufacturing plants
and 944 receiving stations and its
business averaged around S6,0OO,00O
n month.
Another metropolitan milk produc-
ers' association that has become known
throughout the United States because
of its outstanding success is the Twin
City Milk Producers association of
st. Paul and Minneapolis, which was
started in September of 1916.
AT least 90 per cent of the milk used
in the Twin Cities is cooperative milk
n about one-half of this comes in
on big trucks which go directly to the
dealers plant the other so per cent
goes to the company's plants. There
are IA plants located within a radius
of 40 miles of the city equipped to
make both butter and cheese and with
enough capacity to handle every drop
of the milk that is sold.
During 1922, 1900 dairy farmers of
the district were under contract to
deliver all their milk and cream to
their local plants. The members av-
erage from % to 60 tents per hundred
pounds more for their milk thar the
u~norganized producers.
Have Different Arrangement.
Producers around New England
cities have still a different type of
cooperative arrangement. Dairymen
of five New England states, 20,S00 of
them in all. have formed the New Eng
hand Milk Producers association. The
district is divided into 81 zones. In
the largest city of each zone a COM
mittee made up of four local produc-
ers and n representative of the par
ent organization bargain with the
dealers in selling the members milk.
Boston being the largest city in the
district, acts as chief arbitrator. Each
member has signed an agreement to
make the milk committee of the asso-
citation his agent in selling all the milk
he produces. Fol his service the asso-
citation receives one-half of one per
cent of the proceeds.
The producers of the Philadelphia
territory have been organized for some
years, but up until 1916 they drifted
along unable to better their condition.
A crisis in the milk situation that year
resulted In the reorganization of the
Interstate Milk Producers associa-
tion. Then began the present era of
collective bargaining. The association
is purely a selling agent. 1t hasn't a
dollar invested in plants. 1t handles
no milk. 1t is simply the representa-.
tive of 1900 dairy farmers in Penn
sylvania, Delaware. New Jersey and
Maryland to bargain with the dealers
Of the Philadelphia territory in arriv-
ing at a fair milk price. For these
services the dairymen pay a commits
sion of one cent for each 100 pounds
of milk delivered.
In this territory a seasonal surplus
plan is being used. Producers receive
the regular milk price only for their
basis production" The amount de
livered by a producer in October, No
vember and December is his basis pro-
duction. If he delivers more in any
other month than in the average of
the three named the excess is paid for
only at a little above butterfat value.
In May, June or July a producer may
deliver 10 per cent of the basis
amount at the full price.
Pittsburgh dairymen' AVE a dupli-
cate of the Philadelphia plan. Balti-
more, Washington, Cleveland. Cincin-
natl and st. Louis have for several
years been operating on a bargaining
basis, but they are now coming by
n route or another to the Chicago
or New York ideas.