11/20/08 Milk prices: Risch assignments

The USDA has changed its 2009 milk price forecast. World Outlook Board chairman Gerald Bange has lowered the numbers. BANGE "What we're looking at is an all milk price of $15.75 per hundredweight for the 2009 year that's down about 14 percent from the $18.35 it will have recorded in 2008." Bange says Class III and Class IV milk prices are the reason for the all-milk drop. BANGE "Class III price at $15.20 per hundredweight, that's down about seven percent from our previous forecast and twelve percent from last year and really reflects lower cheese and whey prices. The Class IV price down rather sharply." Down eleven percent from October and down 19 percent from October of 2007. The global economy and increased competition are behind the decrease in prices according to Bange. What committee assignments will Idaho's Jim Risch get next month when he becomes a new member of the 111th Congress? Senator Mike Crapo will have some say in that thanks to his appointment as chairman of the Senate Republican Committee on Committees. The committee negotiates the process of assigning GOP Senators like Risch and Crapo to standing committees. Voice of Idaho Agriculture Bill Scott