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Last week’s signing by President Trump of the Healthy Milk for Kids Act marked a major victory for kids as well as dairy farmers.
Gregg Doud, President and CEO of the National Milk Producers Federation, says he couldn’t have been more pleased with the support the bill received in Washington.
“We got 100 US senators, unanimous consent, support of this. We had a couple holdouts. It was a huge amount of work. Cannot thank Senator Marshall enough, and Chairman Boozman; GT Thompson in the House. An unbelievable effort, but we got this done. This is a real big deal for kids in schools.”
Doud says new data indicates it’s also a big deal for embattled dairy farmers.
“There has been some analysis by, I won’t name them, but they’re one of the biggest purveyors of milk in schools in America. Their estimate is that it’ll take somewhere in the neighborhood of $150 million to implement this because, you know, whole milk costs a little bit more than skim milk, so we’re talking about a penny or two, but soaking up that fat and whole milk versus 1% in terms of demand, the calculation is that that could add $2 billion to the milk checks of U.S. dairy farmers.”
Doud says it really is all about the kids, adding, “we’re righting an historic wrong in terms of feeding our kids in this country.”
Source: NAFB News Service