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Grant creates opportunities to study Missouri’s dairy industry more

Missouri Dairy’s new executive director is looking forward to growing the organization.

Alfred Brandt says he’s concerned with the state of the dairy industry in Missouri.

“We’re losing dairy farms. We’re losing some cows. It’s kind of a mirror of this national average. The entire southeast part of the country is losing them at a little bit faster rate.”

He says another challenge for many dairy farms is labor.

“As farmers in general get older and they don’t have someone at home to take it over, that makes the logical step for them to leave the business, but we would like to see that younger generation take an interest.”

Brandt says a recent $250,000 grant from the state legislature will study the dairy industry challenges and opportunities.

“The University of Missouri has already put together a summary of where we have been in the past decade, two decades, in the state as far as number of cows, number of farms.”

The grant will also fund a summit happening this November.

“We’ll go over the study, we’ll decide what steps we need to take to keep the dairy industry stable in Missouri.”

He says the organization will be inviting farmers, bankers, milk haulers and other industry stakeholders. Brandt joined Missouri Dairy June 1st.

Stangler recently interviewed Brandt during a Missouri Dairy Summer Social event at Milk Source’s LaBelle Dairy in La Belle, Missouri.