[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 146 (Saturday, October 8, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: October 8, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                        INTERSTATE DAIRY COMPACT

  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, last night, Senators Leahy, Jeffords, and 
Mitchell spoke on the Senate floor regarding the Northeast Interstate 
Dairy Compact and their regret that action was not taken on the compact 
in the 103d Congress.
  I would also like to say a few words about the compact.
  It is difficult for me to oppose my friends from the Northeast in 
their efforts to help the dairy farmers of their region. But it is on 
behalf of the dairy farmers of my State, and farmers in other States 
outside the Northeast region, that I felt that I must oppose this 
measure. Not only because I believe the compact would have a negative 
effect on the dairy farmers of regions outside the northeast but also 
because I believe it to be an inappropriate method of addressing the 
problems of the dairy industry, which are national in nature.
  The Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact is an effort by six 
Northeastern States to require artificially increased milk prices for 
the farmers in those States exclusively, and to effectively prevent 
other regions from competing in that market.
  The sponsors of this measure claim that the Northeast is an island 
unto itself and that this compact will not affect any other region. I 
believe this claim ignores the complexities of dairy markets, which are 
national in nature.
  To predict the exact effects of this compact on other regions is 
nearly impossible. But to assume that there will be none is to turn a 
blind eye to the history of agricultural policy.
  My region of the country, the upper Midwest, has learned this lesson 
all too well. We have seen our dairy industry become the victim of 
unforeseen market distortions caused by an inequitable and outmoded 
milk marketing order system.
  Restoring regional equity to dairy policy is the most pressing 
Federal policy need facing the farmers of my State. But the compact 
proposed by the Northeastern States takes us in entirely the opposite 
direction, toward balkanization of our dairy industry, and away from 
national unity.
  It is long been my belief that in the absence of true reform of the 
milk marketing order system, the type of regional pricing policy 
proposed in the Northeast Dairy Compact is detrimental to the Dairy 
farmers of my region and the Nation as a whole.
  It is my hope that next year we will be able to achieve comprehensive 
reform to our dairy pricing policies, to address the problems facing 
dairy farmers of all regions. And I look forward to working with my 
friends from the Northeast to that end.

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