DAIRY-FARMERS AND THE PRICE OF MILK.
IT is not often that English farmers are roused to spontaneous and united action, much as they are given to grumbling ; and when we see the dairy-farmers of the principal pastoral counties forming unions with remarkable rapidity, we may be certain that they are moved by some real grievance. We might say, some grievance which touches their pockets directly, as we cannot call to mind a farmers' movement of any con- siderable extension which was not actuated by financial considerations. On the present occasion, the C18118 bell is the low price which dealers in the towns have been paying them for their milk ; and its justification is already obvious, as the retailers are acceding to their by no means extravagant demands. It appears that during the past spring and summer, and for the same seasons in one or two previous years, the farmers have been getting only ad. to 7d. a gallon for milk delivered in London and many other large towns, from id. to id. a gallon, and sometimes more, having to be deducted for rail-freight. Seeing that consumers in the Metropolis have been paying 4d. to 5d. a quart as a rule, while the price has been 4d. in most provincial towns, it is not surprising that the farmers should at last have come to the conclusion that they have not been getting their fair share of the returns. For winter and summer together, they have not generally received more than 8d. a gallon, less rail charges, while the retailers have charged Is. 4d. to Is. 8d. In the poor districts of London, and in many other towns, some milk has been retailed at is. a gallon ; but it is suspected, and indeed alleged by men who ought to know, that this low-priced commodity is in great part separated milk,—that is, milk from which the cream has been taken by the centrifugal cream-separator. Now, making all possible allowances for the expense of carting milk long distances, and delivering it in small quantities from house to house, it is certain that the profits of the retailers have been enormous. Milk-selling has always been accounted a profitable occupation, even when the farmers were getting half as much again for their milk as they have been receiving lately ; yet there has not been any reduction in the retail price. Strong as their case was, however, we doubt whether the farmers would have been moved to united action if it had not been for the losses they have suffered through the recent drought. During the summer, they declare, they obtained only two-thirds of the usual quantity of milk from their cows, and had to go to great expense for purchased food to get so much. Under these circumstances, to sell milk at from 6c1. to 7d. a gallon, carting it to a local station, and paying rail-carriage into the bargain, was a ruinous business ; and so the dairy-farmers of several counties have formed "Milk Unions," local and central, in order to insist on being paid 8d. a gallon in the summer half of the year, and 10d. in the winter months. Singly, they declare, they have no chance of bargaining on equal terms with the great contractors, who can easily form "rings" if they are disposed to do so, and control the market price ; hence their resolve to act together for the future.
Apart from the question of dealers' profits, very little calculation is needed in order to show that farmers cannot be fairly remunerated when they get no more than about 7d. a gallon net for their milk. Five hundred gallons a year per cow would probably be in excess of the average yield of all the cows in the country ; and that quantity, at the price just named, would bring in only £14 I ls. 8d. If this amount would pay the expense of feeding an average cow, it certainly would not suffice to pay interest on capital, labour, deteriora- tion, and occasional losses through disease, even after making all due allowance for the value of an annual calf and the manure. No doubt in some of the best dairies the average yield is much above five hundred gallons a year ; but at six hundred the returns would amount to only £17 108., and
the cost of keep would be greater than where the smaller yield is obtained. It must be borne in mind that to send all the milk away is to cause a considerable drain upon the fertility of the soil, which must be made good by purchased food or manure. If the farmers can secure an average of 9d. a gallon gross, or 8d. net, they will be fairly, but not too well paid,—and that they seem likely to obtain. At any rate, many of the dealers have already agreed to pay 10d. for the coming winter half-year, beginning with October, we believe.
It has been suggested that the farmers should co-operate to sell milk by retail in the large towns ; and there could not be a simpler form of co-operative business, the only difficulty being the supply of the necessary capital. Many farmers who live close to towns have long been in the habit of retailing their own milk, and, when their rents are not exorbitant, they find the business highly remunerative. There are, too, several so- called Farmers' Supply Associations in different parts of the country; but scarcely any of them, we fear, are purely co- operative, while many are certainly merely joint-stock under- takings, whether there are any farmers among the shareholders er not. Some time ago, a number of dairy-farmers in the neighbourhood of New York became dissatisfied with the small portion of the prices paid by consumers which they obtained, and started a co-operative business for the retail supply of milk and butter, with highly successful results. In Holland,Denmark, Germany, Italy, and S witzerland, such under- takings are numerous, and bearing in mind the sharpness of the competition which dairy-farmers in this country have to meet in respect of butter and cheese, it seems quite time for following the example thus set to them. Farming in these days will not support all the classes of people who in the past have lived out of it, directly or indirectly. Middlemen appear to take as large a proportion as ever of the returns, while landowners, farmers, and labourers have had their shares greatly reduced. The struggle for existence seems to be approaching the climax of intensity, and if farmers do not rouse themselves, they will not be among the fittest who will survive. We doubt whether, in the long-run, they will be able to hold their own against the middlemen by mere trade-unions to regulate prices. However apparently complete the unanimity may be in the case of the movement just started, many members of the Unions will be pretty certain to "tail off" in course of time, actuated by some immediate advantage which will outweigh all considerations of class benefit. In co-operation for the direct supply of agricultural produce to consumers, on the other hand, the farmers have a weapon with which they can successfully and permanently fight the middlemen who at present absorb nearly all the profit derived from the cultivation of the soil. Almost as much may be said in favour of the kind of co-operation which is proving highly advantageous to agriculturists in France, where, during the last two or three years, "Agricultural Syndicates," as they are termed, have sprang up in great number, and have been maintained—chiefly for the purchase of seeds, manures, im- plements, and feeding-stuffs of genuine quality at fair prices— with increasing success. At present there are not half-a-dozen such institutions in this country ; but there is no reason that we can see why they should not be established, or why they should not undertake the business of retail supply as well as that of wholesale purchase.
Milk-dealers, like millers, are prompt in raising and tardy in reducing prices ; and in some towns, where they have been selling at 3d. a quart, they are already agreeing to advance to 4d. In London, where 4d. and 5d. are the usual prices, there can be no excuse for a change. What there is more reason to fear is a deterioration of quality. Dealers have been used to large profits, and will not cheerfully submit to a reduction. There are honourable men among them who sell genuine "whole" milk, and will not adulterate it. They can well afford to sell at Is. 8d. —the price which many of them obtain in London—what will coat them 9d., on an average, for the whole year, and their customers may trust them to keep up their reputation for supplying a genuine article. Bat there are too many milkmen whose consciences are elastic, and for whom the large quantity of separated milk now produced in all large towns is a great deal too handy for consumers to think of it without uneasiness. Separated milk is wholesome enough, of course, and useful food, having lost nothing but its cream ; and it is quite fresh, but poorer in fat than skimmed milk. If we must have adulterated milk, we could not have a less objectionable adul- terant; but to mix separated with new milk, and sell the whole as new, is a fraud nevertheless, and inspectors should keep a sharp look-out to detect it during the winter. Householders
seldom take the trouble to test the milk they buy, and those who do are usually satisfied with the lactometer, which is of no use to an amateur for detecting the fraud in question. Indeed, it is apt to deceive ; for whereas milk adulterated with water is of less specific gravity than pure milk, the abstraction of cream has the contrary effect, and the fluid consisting partly of separated milk might be supposed by the uninitiated to be specially good. The cream-gauge is the best means of roughly estimating the quality of milk when the addition of separated milk is suspected ; and if there is not at least 8 per cent. of cream in the tube after twenty- four hours' setting, the consumer should not be satisfied. Complete analysis, however, is required to afford sufficient evidence for the conviction of an offender, and even that is not satisfactory unless it takes place while the milk is quite fresh. The truth is, that the existing arrangements for detecting and punishing fraud in the sale of milk are by no means satisfactory, and should be improved.
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