Organic Dairy Farm Operation

Organic Dairy Farm Operation

My research has lead me to believe that an organic dairy operation would be more valuable in the long run, as part of a larger organic farm operation.  It is not exclusively the increase in cost off set by the increase in value to the milk that is the determining factor, but that it is part of a more dynamic farming operation.  To make the farm profitable in these times of economic instability, it is necessary to farm dynamically.  This means integrated practices, and diversified operations.  This is good for the farm itself, but also for the community in which it operates.  A fully operating dairy will employ a small number of people from the local area, providing them often with more than just a paycheck, but with many other benefits, such as housing if needed, and products at substantial discounts, if not part of their benefits themselves.  A well developed diversified farm operation can provide even more jobs for the community in many other areas that would not be directly related to the dairy operations.  A fully integrated farm operation has many areas that are continuous and would require more people working in different capacities of production, depending on the level of diversity that is integrated into the farm operations.  Such areas as crop operations and other basic agricultural related operations will be handled by the same employees as would the dairy.  However such operations as the creamery,, or other processing plants would require a different work force.  These are more manufacturing jobs than agricultural jobs, and would have not only processing opportunities, but also administrative opportunities.  There are also transportation and logistics to consider, and sales that are also part of the larger operation of a more diversified dynamic farm operation.  As I have looked at various operations that currently have been developed, many fall short of the diversified dynamic operation that could provide the community with not only healthy alternatives to the mass produced and imported products now available in their local markets, but also a stable and growing opportunity for employment.  As the community grows around the farm operation, more opportunity will be developed as the farm requires greater support to continue to operate.  Such support operations include various skilled crafts as metal workers, pottery workers, textile workers, and other such skilled crafts.  This opens the community to new opportunities that will continue to build its strength rather than continue to weaken it from loss of labor or trade.

On a larger scale this community can be duplicated in other communities and as each community becomes stronger, the trade between communities becomes more valuable and the connections that are made create a tighter network of communities that can weather economic instability far better than the post industrial communities that are dependent on more centralized production, and long transportation logistics.  Put the cost of transportation on the transporter.  By creating a more sufficient and sustainable community, the trade of goods within the community becomes the basis for trade, while trade through other communities generates trade deficits that must be traded through trade surplus, which generates a unbalanced economy of scale.  Imports become luxury goods that are not necessary, but desired.  They are purchased with the community surpluses that are desired at other points along the trade routes.  Because the negotiation of trade is then on the trader, as is the cost of transportation, the trade then becomes one of what the trader has as its value to the community to what the community has that is of value to the trader, or some other community, if the trader has the connections to know that information before they trade.

This decentralization creates a healthier community that is more supportive of the local economy and less prone to market fluctuation, if less diversified in selection, they are more satisfied in the selection that they do have.  We as a society have become accustomed to this endless selection of options, and it has created a culture of dissatisfaction and anxiety because we do not know if we can make a good selection with so many potential selections we may not make the best selection for our selves or our families.

As the economy continues to spiral down, the need for local economies becomes even more important.  This local economy can only be supported through the building of local diversified bio-dynamic farming, including natural organic dairy operations like we are proposing.

We are finding it very difficult at this time to make this argument, as many people still believe that we will pull out of this economic depression unscathed, intact and with very little in the way of damage to the basic structure of economics and trade.  The reality is that this will not happen.  The government can not save us from our selves.  We have created this situation and we must create the solution.  No amount of our tax dollars being spent of big money buy programs or national social programs is going to rescue our economy or our culture.  We must accept that to begin the transition to a new but old scale, the local community of trade.  Our food supply is in grave danger, or entire ecosystem is threatened, and the only way to save ourselves and our ecosystem is to stop living in the fantasy that the industrial revolution created.  I am not saying that industry is dead, but that the idea that exist, centralized industrial production of cheap goods shipped on time to all points of the known world, ios a system that is not sustainable and can not be sustained in the light of raising transportation cost, the cost of ecology, and the loss of energy that is creates in all scales.  The producer countries get poorer while the consumer countries continue to support a system that will only implode on them as they continue to demand cheaper and cheaper goods, and prices for production and transportation continue to rise, the entire system becomes a balancing act that can not be supported through population growth alone.

No war, no government, no religion will save you, only you can save you.  Remember charity begins at home, help to support your local community by donating your time and money to the local community and buy local.  You can help me with my efforts by posting this document on the web wherever you find people asking how can we help.  It is about helping each other in the community in which you live that changes things.  You can do many things that will help each other.  If you can't find a local farm that will sell you the goods you need to get by, look for one in a nearby community.  It is hard now to make it happen.  I and my wife are struggling to build a bio-diverse natural organic dairy farm operation, but the lack of capital is making it very difficult to get started.  We are working hard to raise this capital through donations to our not for profit organization, but even this is difficult to without the capital to move forward on this project as well.  With all that we would like to do,. it does seem sad that it is simple thing like a few dollars that prevents us from moving forward.  The point is if everyone that read this told someone about our situation, and they all sent us an email we would be able to talk to them about our project to move forward on teaching people how to build communities that will work, but we have not as yet made that penetration, even on the web, even though I have been at this for many years.  It amazes me that people will give money to a God that is all powerful, every week, without question, even though there is nothing that will help them, except they can feel better about themselves.  Granted some religious organizations or at least parts of them do do some work in the communities in which they serve and I applaud them for this, this should be their work, the work of mankind.  There is a place for reverence, but there is a need for assistance of a secular kind, and this is best facilitated by the local clergy.  However too many do not do anything, they sell a suspect bag of goods and offer nothing more than a promise they themselves barely believe.  I myself I guess am a spiritualist, or at least I believe that there is the potential for something inside us that is continuous, like a life force, a type of energy that exhibits a signature, perhaps related to our genetic code, but this is not the same thing as God and religion.  However this will not help us progress.  To progress we must first accept that it is us that creates and destroys, we are responsible for all that happens here, and now.  By accepting our own part in the greater responsibility of our culture we then begin to travel down that path that leads us to the relaity that faces us today.  Progress is sometimes regressive, or at least appears that way.  It is not that we need to denounce what progress we have made technologically, it is that we must accept that it itself will not solve our problems, and that sometimes, technology is not the answer.  That sometimes when it isn't broken do not try to fix it.  Nature has a built in fail safe, we need not try to put one there.  Technology is great for communication, for this it is indispensable, but sometimes, we need to step back and say, hey, if it works leave it alone.

Well I have gone on for quite some time now, and I will probably come back to this subject again.  Remember that we have the power to change our world, use of lose it, that is the truth.

Thank you, and good night...

James