Farmers destroying crops to prevent a surplus and keep prices up.

[Cattledog]

Source CBS Evening News.

[BigmanPigman]

1. I thought they were getting subsidies.

[Bantamfancier]

2. There's just so much wrong in that headline.

I’m not sure where to start.
For instance, how long can you store an ear of sweet corn?
How much on farm milk storage could one farm possibly have?
If the canners and processors aren’t taking anymore, what do the farmers do with it?

[Pillow talk]

5. give to food banks maybe?

[MarcA]

8. +1,000 n/t

[Happy Hoosier]

10. Need the logitics

Saw a thing on this last night. The supply chain is not set for this. If we had a leader who gave a shit, perhaps, we would have supply chain czar who could coordinate this.

[Pillow talk]

13. this isn't correct. not the part about having leader (we don't obviously) . there are

organizations Actually geared just for this . maybe not to scale but available non the less

[Happy Hoosier]

17. My understanding...

... is that the excess is largely due to reduced demand in the commercial supply chain, and difficulty in increasing capacity in other chains.

[A HERETIC I AM]

9. From what little I know about the industry, here's my answers;

For instance, how long can you store an ear of sweet corn?

On the cob for retail sale? Not long. 60 days, tops

How much on farm milk storage could one farm possibly have?

About 2 milkings worth, so it depends on the size of the herd. I have driven by plenty of dairy farms over the years and never saw a large, stainless steel storage tank. Not once, not ever. What I have seen is tankers coming by twice or 3 times a day (Or even constantly for the huge, 24/7 operations) to haul it to the processing plant.

If the canners and processors aren’t taking anymore, what do the farmers do with it?

"Disc it under" is I believe the term they use. Using a Disc Plow they just run over the field and turn perfectly good crops back into the soil.

[Bantamfancier]

21. You understand what the farmers are up against.

They don't have the facilities or the transportation capacity to handle this.

Only thing I believe you got wrong was the sweet corn.
No way I would eat a 2 month old ear. Even in storage, the sugars break down and after a week you've got mush.

Food banks want a variety of foodstuffs. Their cold storage limits how much they can handle.

[A HERETIC I AM]

25. You are probably correct.

I said 60 days knowing that when you see an ear of corn in the grocery store, it hasn't been that long since it was picked, but I figured I would give it some extra time because of refrigeration.

But yeah, if the producers are not able to get their product to market in a timely fashion, it goes to waste. I know for instance, that thousands of tons of bell peppers are trashed annually merely because they don't have the right appearance or shape. Add to that a transportation problem of a packing house issue, and it multiplies.

[hatrack]

11. Vast majority of corn grown in the US isn't for human consumption anyway . . .

Most is flint or dent corn, which is intended for livestock feed and (secondarily) ethanol. You couldn't eat it anyway after drying anyway (it's called "flint corn" for a reason).

Appalling, nonetheless.

[OAITW r.2.0]

26. Cows need milking everyday, regardless of demand.

Expensive to store if there is no manufacturing demand.....they are forced to dump.
Maybe there is a tech opportunity to create some kind of internet based market for sellers/buyers to connect directly and locally?

[Pillow talk]

3. and breaking eggs and pouring out milk. Capitalism may have glitches folks. ..

[former9thward]

14. What socialist country does better feeding its people?

[Pillow talk]

16. lol. Socialism isn't the answer. maybe an attempt to fix the glitches of capatalism is in order.

[former9thward]

19. Capitalism has glitches but the food chain is not one of them.

Not only do American farmers feed the U.S. but they feed people around the world. When government purposely and suddenly shuts down the food chain the fault, if any, is not on the farmers. They are not equipped to store any real amount of what they produce, nor should they. They, and no one else either, is equipped to suddenly move surplus from Nebraska to a food bank in Chicago. We have a very efficient food chain in the U.S. that every other country on earth would like to have. This sudden disruption is not their fault

[Pillow talk]

23. maybe you should watch the farm report every Sunday morning like i do before

you say these things. Farmers have been struggling with the supplies chains since theres been gobal distribution. of course its not their fault. Breaking eggs , rotting crops and pouring milk is a systematic problem of capitalism

[former9thward]

40. How come we have not seen pictures of all these things before?

Since they have been going on since global distribution? Negligence by the media? Silence by the farmers? How come we see this just in the last couple weeks?

[Pillow talk]

45. the farmers are vocal, its just not reported. Except on the farm reports which

Have a fairly specific audience.

[former9thward]

47. Ok. A media conspiracy to hide years or decades of milk dumping.

Got it....

[Pillow talk]

49. no conspiracy. its just not the type of news no big newsroom chooses.

[Amishman]

20. capitalism has nothing to do with it

consumption is down and these are perishable commodities at a time when transport logistics are badly strained. There is nowhere to go with it.

[Pillow talk]

24. Excuse me? there are folks that are in urgent need of these commodities

[Amishman]

44. And what are they going to do with a tanker of milk?

The dairy doesn't bottle it and can't store it. They are at the mercy of the downstream supply chain. This isn't evil dairy farmer dumping milk to raise prices, the farmer is also getting screwed by the logistical snarl created by a radical shift in consumption patterns.

The problem is logistics.

[Pillow talk]

46. Its not the farmers. as you just explained its capitalism.

[Submariner]

4. ABC News just showed many thousands of zucchini and yellow summer squash

All harvested and scattered on the ground to rot. With all the hungry people Trump should have army trucks and soldiers transporting this stuff to food banks. What madness.

[rzemanfl]

7. How many soldiers can a truck hold if they are sitting six feet apart?

The supply chain for restaurants, schools and offices is there but unusable.

[durablend]

18. You don't feed the people if you want to get rid of them

Just sayin....

[rzemanfl]

6. On the local TV news I watched a line of trucks dumping milk on the ground.

Cows have to be milked even if there is no way to get that milk to market.

[beachbumbob]

12. I can;t blame them BUT this goes back to a lack of Federal Pandenic plan

[Blue_true]

31. Yes. Food security is a key part of such a plan.

Trump had a plan handed to him, but President Obama had overseen it, so it was immediately discarded without any review.

[redwitch]

15. A farm near here is giving milk away by the truckload.

Or they were last week.

[SheltieLover]

30. Glad to hear not dumping it!

Perhaps impractical, but why don't farmers open fields for free food for those in need?

In Appalacia, many schools have "backpack" food programs where staff stuff kids' backpacks every Friday at end of day. Truckers haul semis of locally grown produce as volunteers.

Reason is that these families would not have a single crumb to eat all weekend without this effort.

I have seen ads for "free sweet potatoes" once - truckers hauled 80k pounds to a distribution center to be distributed free for everyone - again in Appalacia.

So let people take corn & beans, no?

[Blue_true]

32. In theory, the farmers would be responsible if people get sick.

If they can't sell to distributors, it is simpler to let it rot.

Someone pointed out, the problem is the absence of a pandemic plan where a large part of the country gets shut down and food security becomes an issue. President Obama had such a plan, Trump didn't bother with one.

[SheltieLover]

37. Ty for explaining

I have the utmost respect for farmers. Likely if there were a way, they would implement it.

Yes, the problem is shitstain. 🤬

TY again.

[davekriss]

22. Didn't they do that during the Depression?

[Blue_true]

34. Early on under Hoover. I believe FDR bought it up for use feeding hungry people, and

CCC camps.

[Under The Radar]

27. Bet the little guys don't.

[OAITW r.2.0]

28. Why is demand down?

Obviously, the market is in chaos. Buyers aren't producing becaus users employees aren't working.

Cows need to be milked everyday and it spoils if there is no immediate demand through the "traditional" supply chain. Costs a lot to store it and it still will spoil.

That doesn't mean there isn't a user demand for these products. A better , more direct seller to buyer market needs to emerge. Could be the next indispensable application for market efficiency and survival.

[Blue_true]

35. I read a detailed article about it.

A lot of farmers sold to schools, restaurant supply companies and big office installations. They sold like 50 pound sacks of potatoes or 25 pound boxes or eggs, or large containers of milk to processors that would break it into many smaller units. With their end customers idle, the farmers have no way of repackaging for sale in grocery stores. Someone pointed out that a national disaster or pandemic plan has issues like taking food that would be destroyed and stockpiling it for eventual public use, Trump ignored such planning.

[OAITW r.2.0]

36. Sounds about right. These institutional customers are down...but need hasn't changed.

The lessons we are learning about how fragile our institutions are during a pandemic....

[Under The Radar]

29. Remember the Federal Cheese program?

Over production of dairy products was bought by the government and given to low income families.
But Democrats were in control of Congress then.

[3catwoman3]

33. We watched a segment on this just last evening. As referenced in post 17...

...above, the big hang up is decreased demand from organizations that buy in bulk - school cafeterias, college dining halls, restaurants.

This is heartbreaking.

[Haggis for Breakfast]

38. This is SINFUL.

Right now, food banks across the nation are BEGGING for help.

This is NOT astro-physics -- FIGURE IT THE FUCK OUT. Ask for volunteers. Mobilize. Pull together.

To let food rot while people are starving is SINFUL.

[madville]

39. The problem isn't the quantity of whatever dairy or produce

There isn't a feasible way to deliver it to the consumer, even for "free". You can't park a tanker of unpasteurized raw milk in front of a food bank and have people bring their own containers to fill up.

More and more food processors are shutting down this week due to employees catching the virus as well, processing capacity is shrinking.

[Haggis for Breakfast]

42. I was referring to farmed vegetables, fruits, produce.

And yes, you CAN do something about that. One community of volunteers up in BC, drove in convoys in their pick ups, picked crops in the field, filled trucks up with produce and delivered it to a food bank for immediate distribution.

THIS IS NOT NEUROSURGERY !!

Whatever happened to the American spirit of "We can do this ?" Communities all over Canada right now are making us look like bozos down here. They are pulling together, figuring out how to get things done instead of pushing back on how difficult/oh, the logistical nightmare/but what about(ism) . . . .?

For those of us who remember WWII, people pulled together. Got things done. THAT is how America used to work. I am fed up to my fucking eye teeth with the lack of community spirit.

We are ALL in this together until it's over.

[BGBD]

41. most states

have laws regarding who farmers can actually sell raw milk products to, and for good reason.

There are also reasons they cant hive these away. it costs a lot of money to harvest and get something transported somewhere to sell. There are also a lot of reasons to not want masses of people wondering in your fields. MN

If you cant sell to a distributor who can come get the product, it's more economical to just plow under. it's cheaper then harvesting so it is loss mitigation.

Still, I dont see a lack of food anywhere. The problem seems to be a lack of money to buy food and bottlenecks in getting that food to them through food distribution centers.

[roamer65]

43. Yes they do.

Raw milk can give one some nasty bugs.

[Yeehah]

48. While millions of Americans are unemployed,

farmers destroy food. They took billions in handouts, funded by American taxpayers. May be they should find a way to get the food to some taxpayers.

[MerryBlooms]

50. It's on the news now, how much longer will they get away with this behavior?

Folks with big farms might find their fields filled with pickup trucks and people who are fed up with getting screwed in every way but a good way.