Will Rural Dairy and Ag Farmers turn away from Democratic Candidates ideas to save and futurize their businesses.

WKOW’s Capital City Sunday’s host A.J. Bayatpour became the first newsperson to ask candidates running for office what they would do to help dairy and ag farmers survive in Wisconsin. 

Bayatpour asked Democratic candidates how they would help, and guess what, that had solid proposals, which I’ve listed below. 

But first……I’ve never seen this same question leveled at Republicans, who have ignored farmers and taken their rural vote for granted. For instance; Republicans abandoned farmers completely under Walker. I wrote this back in Jan. 2016:

In 2020, Gov. Evers forced Republicans to reconsider that bad decision, but…

Adam Warthesen, director of government and industry affairs at Organic Valley, said the state’s efforts are coming too late for many dairy farmers who have gone out of business in the last few years. “We should be out in front and figuring out what’s going to help agriculture earlier in every year,” Warthesen said. 

They even wanted to make it easier for farmers to lose those farms…not kidding: Walker went after Rural Farmers Estates to Fund Medicaid:

Farmers are now dealing with the stacked-up effects of a pandemic, supply chain disruptions and inflation. 

1. Outagamie County Executive Tom Nelson wants to bring back parity pricing, which ties commodity prices to production costs. “What this means is ensuring a consistent and fair price for farmers,” Nelson said. “So this controls the up and down spikes, like what we’re seeing right now.”

2. Making broadband internet a public utility.

3. Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes’ “Barnes for Barns” tour tied together ag and climate policy and shifting federal subsidies away from corporate farms. “Making sure our farms are more resilient in the face of climate change, which is making it harder for our small family farmers.”

4. State Treasurer Sarah Godlewski’s campaign touts a 12-page rural policy plan. She said her first act in the U.S. Senate would be asking for a seat on the Senate’s agricultural committee, neither the Senate nor House ag committees currently have any members from Wisconsin. 

5. She would prioritize the development of a health care program specifically for farmers.

6. Milwaukee Bucks executive Alex Lasry said he believed a key solution was offering loan forgiveness to farmers. A bill doing just that was introduced in the Senate last year but hasn’t been called for a vote. 

7. Lasry said he also would push to give credits to domestic fertilizer producers, hoping to lower costs and, in turn, make a crucial supply more affordable for farmers.

8. Both Nelson and Barnes specifically mentioned growth management, a concept supported by the Wisconsin Farmers Union and the Farm Bureau Federation, which aren’t always on the same page. The idea is similar to a luxury tax in professional sports; if a farm decides to capitalize on high prices by increasing production, it has to pay a fee that goes into a pot that’s divided among all farmers. That way, the theory goes, if the spiked supply depresses prices, smaller farms can weather that drop with the funds they receive through fee sharing.

A former liberal radio talk host who likes to ask the “follow-up question” at Democurmudgeon.blogspot.com