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Urban Water Institute Water Policy Conference Delta Fix: Can Agribusiness Afford It?

Urban Water Institute Water Policy Conference Delta Fix: Can Agribusiness Afford It?. Geoffrey Vanden Heuvel Dairy Farmer / Vice-Chairman, Milk Producers Council August 24, 2012. Fun Facts About Milk and Dairy Cows. Real milk comes from cows

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Urban Water Institute Water Policy Conference Delta Fix: Can Agribusiness Afford It?

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  1. Urban Water InstituteWater Policy ConferenceDelta Fix: Can Agribusiness Afford It? Geoffrey Vanden Heuvel Dairy Farmer / Vice-Chairman, Milk Producers Council August 24, 2012

  2. Fun Facts About Milk and Dairy Cows • Real milk comes from cows • A cow needs to have a calf to start producing milk

  3. Fun Facts About Milk and Dairy Cows • A calf: • Weighs about 100 pounds at birth • Walks and starts nursing its mother at about 1 hour after birth • Gains about 2 pounds per day, and is weaned at about 75 days of age • Is ready to breed at 15 months old • The gestation period of a cow is 9 months • So at 2 years old, a cow is ready to have her first calf and start producing milk

  4. What Is Milk Made Of? • “Average” Holstein cow milk is made up of: • 3.5% butterfat • 3.2% protein • 5% lactose • 0.5% minerals • 87.8% water

  5. What Is Milk Made Of? • So in the grocery store: • “Whole milk” is 3.5% butterfat • “Lowfat milk” is 2% butterfat • “Skim milk” is 0.25% butterfator less

  6. Cheese • About 40% of California’s milk is manufactured into cheese • Cheese is really the binding together of the protein in milk, 80% of which is casein (or glue), with the butterfat in milk • So when you make cheddar cheese, the butterfat and protein end up in the cheese, and the lactose and non-casein proteins end up in “whey” • “Eating her curds and whey…”

  7. Milk and Dairy Products • Milk weighs about 8.6 pounds per gallon • It takes about 1.16 gallons of milk to make 1 pound of cheddar cheese • In California, we produce more than 2 billion pounds of cheese per year (mostly cheddar and mozzarella), which makes up about 20% of the total U.S. production of cheese • We also make about 620 million pounds of butter per year (about 40% of the U.S.), and more than 1 billion pounds of milk powders per year (about 58% of the U.S.) • Only 11-14% of California’s milk is actually sold as fluid milk in the stores

  8. Lactose-Free Milk • Do you know how they make “lactose-free” milk for those who are lactose intolerant? I didn’t either, until a few months ago. • At the processing plant, milk is put in a holding tank, and an enzyme is added to the milk, which converts the lactose to fructose. So “lactose-free” milk tastes sweeter because fructose is sweeter than lactose.

  9. How About Chocolate Milk? Do You Know Where It Comes From? “Bessy the Brown Cow”

  10. What Cows Eat • A cow is a “ruminant” animal, which means they need a certain amount of forages in their diet • About 40% of a dairy cow’s diet needs to be forage, which consists of alfalfa hay and/or silages • Mature milking cows eat about 50 pounds of “dry matter” per day

  11. California’s Dairy Industry • About 1.7 million dairy cows in California • These cows need a lot of forage, including alfalfa hay and silages, to be sustained • Silages cannot be transported long distances because they have a high moisture content • Alfalfa hay is an essential part of sustaining the California dairy herd

  12. California’s Dairy Industry • There are 980,000 acres of alfalfa hay production ground in California • 75% of the alfalfa produced in California goes to the dairy industry (15% to horses, 5% to export, and the balance to beef, sheep and others) • 50% of the alfalfa acres in California are located in regions of the State impacted by the Delta

  13. Delta Fix Impacts • Current agricultural water costs to grow alfalfa range from $35 per acre-foot to $75 per acre-foot • Studies have indicated that the Delta fix will add $180 per acre-foot to the cost of agricultural water

  14. Delta Fix Impacts • Growing alfalfa in the Central Valley requires about 4-5 acre-feet of water per acre of alfalfa. • 500,000 acres of alfalfa in the CV = 2.0-2.5 million acre-feet • $180 per acre-foot X 2 million acre-feet = $360 million • The dairy industry is highly regulated. There is no method of “recapturing” this $360 million from our customers • This seems like a problem

  15. Economic Value of the Dairy Industry to California • The California Milk Advisory Board has analyzed the economic impact of the California dairy industry: • $63 billion in economic impact • 443,000 jobs • For every job on the farm, another 22 jobs are created beyond the farm

  16. Bottom Line No alfalfa No dairy industry

  17. Thank You. Questions?

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