NFO-277 (AV10776): US Farm Report: Grain Marketing Mid-America

[music] Hi, everybody, and welcome to U.S. Farm Report. My special guests this week, Mr. Chris Walker, national treasurer of the National Farmers Organization, and no stranger to U.S. Farm Report, Mr. John Oster, assistant to the director in NFO's Grain Department. We'll also be looking at some interviews, that were made by our U.S. Farm Report crew, at a recent visit in Salina, Kansas, to the eighth annual NFO convention, of the sunflower state. Chris, it's a pleasure to have you on our show today. This is your first time, I hope that you can survive it, John has many times and he's still in good health. I'm real glad to be with you today, Bill. Our pleasure, indeed. You weren't out of Salina, John, were you? No, I wasn't [unclear]. A real great convention. We were there and covered it, as you know. Chris, you did an excellent job of of seeing that everything went along well and it was quite- quite an accomplishment. A lot of work goes into a convention behind the scenes, doesn't it? Well, it certainly does, Bill. The work of about three directors, and five district represent- state chairman of the different districts working together with our legislative representatives, our auditing director and, also, a public publicity director. We held meetings starting April planning toward this convention. And a lot of credit goes to all of the fine help that we had, besides more than 50 elected representatives from the different districts, who conducted the convention, and helped to make it work. Well, this was certainly a successful convention for you, Chris, you were re-elected president of NFO in the state of Kansas, and it's my understanding, that this is the fifth time that you have had that particular honor bestowed upon you. And you're to be congratulated. Well, thank you, Bill. I'm really happy to serve the people of Kansas as representative of NFO. You know, John, I like Chris's title here, at national headquarters. He's the man with the purse string, isn't he? The man with the money. So, I think, we should treat him especially nice, don't you? We do. I bet you do. Chris, I'm not gonna ask you to talk about your duties here we know what a national treasurer is and what he doe. But how in the world do you get away to take care of your duties as state president in Kansas. Well, Bill, we have our land lines, here, and in the evening they aren't used so much, and so I'm able to stay in contact with my Kansas people, through our land lines, and, also, I'm back in Kansas. How often do you meet back there, Chris? We meet quarterly as a state board, about every three months. We have to make a plan for, not only the convention, but we have fair booths, which we conduct. We also keep up on legislation pertaining to farming in the Kansas legislature. We have a special representative who spends as much time in our Kansas legislature. John, as you know, I'm sure Kansas is a great grain state, so your department certainly has an interest there and I'm going to be talking with you a little bit later about some of the developments in Kansas and grains some of them good some of them not so good Kansas not only is a grain producing state but I would say perhaps of all the states it's the most diversified agriculturally Chris would you agree to that I certainly would bill we finish about a little of everything in Kansas practically all of the grains and of course livestock and we have irrigation in Kansas and so it's very now you come from north of Topeka I come from Emporia we're practically neighbors as Kansas employee of course is now famous for the great bluestem area the great grazing land and has become I think quite an influential place in terms of feeder cattle there are a lot of feed Lots there as you know yeah well here we have moved probably more than three times as many feeder cattle who are marketing this year last year and it has shown a real effect on the price also well that's good that says a little of the progress of nfo and our state Chris what other successes can you think of well of course there have been some quite a bit of bargaining on white corn we have supplied contracts with Milo and some one wheat and other commodities which definitely have had bearing price first as president NFO and Kansas presiding over the convention I'm sure you were aware of the fact that our US farm report crew was there covering the convention we were in Memorial Hall we were later that evening at the banquet session out at the 4-h building and in the afternoon I had the pleasure of interviewing some of your fine Kansas delegates to the convention why don't you and John join me now and let's watch these interviews Hershel Weber farms 1,300 acres in Haskell County Kansas the county seat I guess of your town Hershel is sublet isn't it it's great now you are president of Pasco County nfo this is right let's talk about your farming operation the Hershel all right what do you grow on your land wheat and mostly corn and some soya beans sugar beets in the past but not at present how does your land treat sugar beets you get a pretty good beat out of the land yes we get a good beat I in fact had the first acreage of sugar beets in Pasco County back in 1956 but I don't know to me beets have problems 12 months out of the year and cattle and enough sow age and picking you're harvesting your crops I had to cut somewhere so beets was the person to go how's the corn looking good you haven't had any blight sir we haven't any blight in our area to my knowledge well it looks like we might have a little better price this year well hopefully so with God working for us and nfo help right right well that's not a bad combination there's no sir but the time has come that we have to have more than efficiency out of our operation we've got to be able to make a profit and the only way that we can make profit is to have favorable marketing the only way we can have favorable marketing is for farmers instead of competing one with another to join together blocking their production and selling it a nephal way I feel very strongly about this and I think that it's time that our universities not only in Kansas but throughout the nation wake up to the fact that perhaps they should preach and teach a little more to the farmer in how to better market their thought out whatever it may be their commodity to their better advantage of course for more profit because it's obvious that if the farmer can make a profit everyone up and down the street is gonna make a profit the machinery people are gonna make a profit it just would create a better economic situation in the old United States in my opinion less rockers is third District president of the National Farmers Organization in partnership with his brother he farms around 2300 acres in Anderson County near the town of garnet garnet which is a familiar place to me you know I I came from Emporia last I know the Garnett Iola Ottawa area pretty well and of course you're now famous down there for the annual race well we was famous the track unsafe and well the town just couldn't afford the kind of money they wanted to bring up the safety stand around tell us about your operation with your brother les is a diversified farming yes I have to say we're probably very diversified we feed hogs we don't raise any that will feed out in the neighborhood of the 500 head AUB's a year and also feed stairs we have a small cow herd gun cleanup herd and general farming we farm raised corn and soybeans and Marlow mostly feed grains or I guess really it be a livestock program what about your marketing do you sell your livestock to NFO yes yes our fat cattle go through the marketing arrangements that the Saint gentleman's are a Dugdale packing company on a grading yield basis and our hogs go through the collection point it stayed steady Kenny this yeah what kind of a crop year have you had or what's been the cause of it lack of moisture go at it you might rain too much got too much rain what about prices to you and your brother do you feel that your affiliation of membership with nfo has really made some difference of dollar-wise to you well I feel it has maybe I can't prove that point but on the other hand the farmer that has never joined nfo can't prove that we haven't helped the improve prizes they're not good but we don't know what they'd be without any so what do you think in general is the farming outlook well I'd have to say it looks awful bleak right now really I can't afford to quit farm and I don't know what a young guy want to get into it for you have the sons I have three sons you think they'll stay on the farm or do you think they'll find it bleak and seek their career no my oldest boy is in eighth grade and I hope by the time that he goes through school farming will be so that he can farm how are we gonna get to that point last that's a big question I well I think there's too much difference so we have men in the city working for $10 an hour with their dinner bucket invested we're working out here with a hundred and fifty thousand dollar investment for what's a nice no live region sixty seventy five cents and I honor and you and I earn fifty cents an hour you earn ten dollars they settled other gentlemen working forty dollars we just can't all compete that's pretty difficult because we all have the same pay the same prices for them no I can't figure it out myself but some way they seem to feel like that if food is cheap enough it'll solve everything Bacon's just as hot as it was when hogs just thirty cents night today they were sawed eighteen nineteen we need price right now totally we the banks have gotten us the big they preached big we got big you had to hell now they've got an individual farmers too big they can't leave enough money to fall to operate on so what are you gonna do there's there's no substitute for prize well Chris and John a presume it has to be pretty discouraging to the average farmer today when he stops to think about what the national average says his income is for his labor where is it John around 80 cents something like that an hour depends on what field of production you're in that's pretty close to the average about 80 cents that's pretty sickening and that's to Chris it certainly is when we realize the investment that farmers have hundred thousand dollars or more many of them and they can only receive 80 cents per hour income for their labors certainly yes well I think that there's an answer to the solution of that problem wouldn't both of you agree I'm really leading you into this like that but nfo is striving to do something about farm commodity prices and maybe this this is the whole answer you know maybe it really is well I believe the attitude of the farmers particularly are at our Kansas Convention was the best that I've ever seen it it seems that they were all unified in their efforts to make aNFO work and they realize that the farmers are going to get a fair price that it's going to be through an fo and so we're going to have to work out it's a hard job to get this accomplished Chris as a farmer and I know that you are one did you have the feeling at one time before becoming affiliated with an apple that you'd rather do it yourself that you would rather remain independent Bill I think all of us had this feeling and yet we probably had another feeling that when we got back from taking a load of corn to town and it was low-cost production or a load of hogs or whatever why I'm sure that many of us have had the feeling that night that I just wish that I was in the position of other people so that I could touch that commodity and then we would have a great feeling at this point right John you're considerably younger than Chris and me what about you do you recall as a farmer or the days when you said by golly I can do it by myself surely do bill and I tried it and it didn't work and it didn't work if it had worked I don't think you'd be here today no I wouldn't bill I started farming for myself in an era when farm prices especially in livestock we're at a roll a low-level mm-hmm I didn't experience any good price in life talk till about 1965 and of course they've been relatively good since then up until just recently and I wonder sometimes now if there is an effort being made parts of the Sigma the economy to drive the price a large talk down to stretch out this short corn crop because we're of the opinion now we're gonna have about a three point seven billion bushel corn crop well I recall John you and I talked on U.S. Farm Report not too many weeks ago about the corn blight problem right and you said at that time that the government had predicted a certain deficiency in the crop and you thought that those figures were absolutely wrong that the deficiency would be three or four times as much as they stated the deficiency with these how is it turned out well so far I think our predictions are holding far more accurate than what the government is the further the harvest progresses people who thought they had a relatively good corn crop are winding up with a lot of damaged corn and the field loss is tremendous yeah and of course this weather the longer the harpes is delayed the greater the field office is going to be well john in the big corn producing states they really have double trouble then may not only the corn blight but also they were affected by drought this was in a lot of the area some areas were too wet and then dry later and it seems like almost all areas that didn't get some light got grow what was the result of all that John one of the result in the crop occurring approximately 30 days earlier than normal and when you have a crop that occurs 30 days ahead of time and what it normally does you're not going to have the you you can't possibly have the yield when you get what's a full term crop and it's going to cut down on the test weight and it's going to cut down on yield yeah Chris what about corn blight in Kansas any trouble with it this year I don't believe we had much problem with corn blight bill however harvest of Milo and harvest of corn has been about 30 days early due to drought and you know and dry weather causes harvest 30 days early it certainly makes inroads into the yield yeah by the way I think I should mention to our viewers that I prematurely elected you the top man in Kansas for nfo when actually this man is selected from the board by the board in me that's right at the state convention the directors were nominated then we will hold our first reorganizational meeting which would be sometime in January after the National Convention and out of this state board a new state chairman will be elected well I'm what you might call the maker of a president this week I made you president or chairman and I'm hoping that that's the way it will really turn out when the directors and cast their votes thank you Bill let's talk about grain in Kansas John now you've had some successes have you not in Milo in Kansas yes we have bill we run into a low price area in southwest Kansas where the producers were selling for what we thought 10 15 20 cents 100 in some cases for less than what that model really should have brought so we found outlets form out of the state we ship model from that area to Arizona to California and we raised the price from that area before the other buyers and were lying there they all local elevators feed off they raise the price up well NFO's selling milo overseas right now right sure are well don't you feel that maybe this is where it lies the great opportunity and grain a great deal of it lies in an export mark yeah but I don't believe that we should be looking at our export markets to determine what the bulk of our feed range should sell for because a small percent of the feed grain actually goes for export the bulk of it is used here to make meat so this is the greatest meat consuming nation in the world and about 90 percent of our free grain is used for meat production and milk production and really we should have a to price system one here in this country for our domestic use of grain which would be in line with the rest of the economy and then if need be probably a little lesser price to sell into the world market to compete if necessary but there's a big market out there bill and there's test customers and they'll pay the price for a lot of this if we simply ask for it to what port are you shipping mainly right now John well the Milo goes to Houston and the beans and the corn are going to New Orleans speaking of beans soybeans are raised in Kansas Chris it's a big crop in Kansas isn't it oh yes in eastern part of the state what about marketing successes through NFO and Kansas for beans John well we have excluders which is a process of taking the whole bean processing it and turning it into animal feed without extracting the oil and the people that are using it are the feeders especially in dairy production and also in fitting a livestock have been very well pleased with it the efficiency of it is so much greater than just the regular soybean meal so there's a lot of these small niche scooters being set up over the country and we supply a lot of them and we supply some of them in eastern Kansas southeastern Kansas but a lot of the bean production is going we're also sending some beans out of the Kansas area for export well we couldn't talk about our home state Chris without talking wheat now you had a good wheat crop this past year didn't you yes bill what about this business that I learned at the state convention John about a wheat really or wheat is wheat is really not the truth you just can't say wheat and brand of the entire crop in that manner would you explain that to me well wheat has a wide variance and in order to make a real good quality bread or wheat that will meet baking specifications they have to blend the variety of the week and some crop years will have a high-protein wheat and some years a low protein wheat and really the basis of buying wheat is protein and prior to the beginning of NF mmm excuse me prior to beginning of NF Oh in in Kansas most of this week was blocked without any protein premium and even after the determination of protein had a value they were buying an on station average well one farmer might take in a load of weed into the elevator and it would have 14 15 percent protein another man taken we said had 11 percent well you blend all this week together and you get a station average fire the inception event at full in the state of Kansas pill wheat was wheat and it was bought mostly an ordinary without any premium being paid to the producer now premium has always been a factor but the farmers never gotten paid for it so we opened the market first follow the farmers or the producers to show them that there could be a premium paid for protein wheat we still have a lot of problems out there where the elevators are under an umbrella of government of state law where they are only obligated to deliver back out to a producer but they call station average where if I would take in 14 or 15 or Chris would take in 14 15 percent protein wheat into the elevator and the station average would happen to be 11 and a half or 12 this is all the elevator operator is obligated to deliver back to Chris so he could lose two three four five percents in protein which doesn't amount to 25 30 40 cents a bushel the only solution at this time of that is either to change the law or farm storage and we are encouraging farm storage all the time in an asshole hoping people will put up the farm storage because in addition to being cheated out of the protein sometimes farmers are paying exorbitant rates for handling charges in and out to get their grain into the elevator and back out to where they might market it it becomes a captive market one minutes in the elevator well NFO I would say is contributing to the increase in quality in wheat in Kansas if you can get this premium paid for a higher protein wheat certainly Chris I should think that the most Kansas wheat farmers wheat ranchers would make an attempt to grow a better date of wheat wouldn't they this is right and we do pay attention to the higher quality of wheat many of us who have stored our wheat on the farm realized from 15 to 40 cents a bushel premium because we had protein in our wheat and certainly this will paid for a farm storage in a very short time yes indeed and speaking of this general lack of farm storage in the sunflower state John you were telling me that this is a real problem with Kansas for corn producers right now definitely bill we have a situation now in what we would call northeast Kansas excuse me Northwest Kansas where there is an irrigated area in there and they harvest the corn at a relatively high moisture somewheres around 18 20 22 percent moisture and they have no facilities on the farm to dry it are very few anyway and as a result they take it into the local elevator and he dries it down oh this corn this fall was being sold as cheap as a dollar and 13 cents a bushel this is dry basis so after the moisture discount is taken I suppose that corn balls about about 80 cents now we had a good outlet for that corn in California ship it west but because of the lack of facilities to dry the corn and load it on a car and ship it we weren't able to get that market somebody else got it or if we would have been able to drive the corn down I can understand taking it out of the field at high moisture but farmers are going to have to be able to condition this corn themselves so that it can be put on railcar and shipped into the better market and not have to tolerate these extremely low prices well wouldn't both of you agree that on the farm storage is a most integral part of NFO's collective bargaining structure definitely have to have it bill without it it just doesn't work does it not very well because how can you hold your grain if you have no place to hold it well it is only a matter of holding it bill that's the additional cost that are added to it many times and of course the blending that you lose in quality and you lose the protection of the protein as we talked about earlier many factors involved where if there was more farm storage I think we would find the elevators the elevators are at this point a month and there a service and we would like to use this facilities but until such time as they get a position where they're willing to charge what we would call a reasonable rate it makes it very difficult to market grain and get the premium back to the farmer John it's been a pleasure having you on our show again this week thank you Bill and pleasure to be here and the most interesting to hear about NFO's grain Department achievements in the state of Kansas Chris congratulations to you again on a fine convention and thank you so much for making your initial appearance on US farm report thank you very great place our pleasure indeed my special guest this week in addition to the interviewees you saw of interviewed at Salina Kansas seen of the NFO state convention I've been Mr. Chris Walker who is the national treasure of the National Farmers Organization and Mr. John Oster who is assistant to the director of the grain commodity department at NFO U.S. Farm Report has seen on this station each week at the same time until we meet again so long everybody