I didn’t write On Brassard’s Farm as social commentary – it’s a story that celebrates Vermont small farms and wild lands, romantic love, community, and just being alive. True, it’s set on a struggling dairy farm, and I depicted the hardships and uncertainties of that life. But as I wrote it, I was focused on love, revelation, and redemption, and I do believe those good things often come to pass despite, or even because of, the hardships we face. The book’s “trailer” — click on the image below this article — makes that clear.
However, its publication date of April 3 coincided with a tragic downturn in Vermont’s dairy farm industry, a crisis well-documented in an excellent series of features by Vermont Public Radio and other Vermont news media.
I can’t claim any paranormal prescience for my anticipation of the current downturn. It’s just that I started writing the book, the first scribbles and notes, back in 2008, around the time of the last disastrous streak in the industry. I had worked on several farm-related state and federal projects; I had met some farmers and was feeling their pain pretty good.
In his April 1, 2018 commentary, Roger Allbee, former Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, provided an excellent big-picture view of the problems facing small dairy farms. He blames declining consumption of fluid milk; increasing reliance on demand from Mexico and Asia; ongoing westward movement of production (as I note in On Brassard’s Farm, a factor affecting Vermont’s dairy viability since the late 1800s); and increased pressure on “traditional” (that is, small, where you let your cows out of the barn) farms to change practices to keep our surface waters clean.
On April 6, John Dillon reported on VPR that “. . . Vermont dairy farmers are experiencing some of the hardest times in recent memory.” According to Dillon, as of that date, “Twelve farms have gone out of business this year [since January 1, 2018], bringing the number of working dairy farms down to around 750, compared to about 1,100 a decade ago. Many farmers in Vermont say they’re getting paid less than what it costs to produce the milk.”
On April 11, Paul Heinz, in a meticulously-documented feature by Seven Days, reported that “In the past year, 61 Vermont cow dairies have ceased operation, leaving the state with just 749 . . .
“Industry leaders fear the closures could accelerate this spring as farmers face an unprecedented fourth year of depressed milk prices. . . The vast majority of dairies going out of business are those with fewer than 200 cows, according to the Agency of Agriculture. At the same time, the number of farms with 700 or more has doubled in the past five years, continuing a decades-long consolidation of the industry.”
No, it was not prescience that led me to write On Brassard’s Farm. Given the trends and cycles, sadly, I knew the story would retain its relevance down the road.
I was pleased to see that the outlook I suggest in On Brassard’s Farm is shared by Roger Allbee, who says “Vermont dairy farmers. . . have demonstrated resilience in the past. It will require continued new thinking and possibly new products beyond fluid milk . . . It will take many working together across the political and economic spectrum. It is too important . . . to do otherwise.”
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