Pa. agriculture secretary Russell Redding meets with farmers
BUTLER TWP — State Secretary of Agriculture Russell Redding touched on many issues during a Friday breakfast meeting with farmers.
Redding, who has served as secretary under five governors since 2009, was the guest speaker at the second annual breakfast for farmers hosted by state Rep. Marci Mustello, R-11th, who serves on the House Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee.
When Gov. Josh Shapiro took office this year and asked Redding to remain in his position as secretary, Redding agreed and asked him to address two agricultural issues.
He said he asked Shapiro to recognize farms as businesses and to make the process to obtain various permits needed in farming less burdensome.
“We have to address permitting,” Redding said.
He said Shapiro wants departments that issue permits to look at the amount of time it takes to process applications.
“There are things we can do to expedite the permitting process. We’re working through it,” Redding said.
Former Gov. Tom Wolf reduced the time it takes to process natural gas drilling permits from about 300 days to a few weeks, he said.
“We make it incredibly difficult to do the right thing,” Redding said.
He answered questions about customers paying over order premium for milk, and the possibility of serving 2% and whole milk in schools.
The premium is assessed on milk that is produced, processed and sold in the state, and is supposed to benefit state dairy farmers, but out-of-state producers are getting some of the money, Redding said.
The premium is built into the minimum wholesale price received by processors, which pass some of it along to their producers. Some producers are independent and some are members of cooperatives.
Critics say some processors avoid paying the premium by shipping milk out of the state to be sold or by having it bottled out of the state.
Another concern is that the state law directs the premium to cooperatives and not their member farms, which leads to out-of-state coop farms getting the premium.
“That money goes to out-of-state producers,” Redding said.
The premium is not assessed on other dairy products, such as ice cream and cheese, even though the amount of milk produced in the state that is sold as milk has decreased from 50% in 1988 to 32% now, Redding said.
He said Shapiro supports allowing whole or 2% milk to be served in schools, but it is restricted by federal law and only Congress can change it.
Mike Frazier, a beef cattle farmer from Harrisville, asked if the government could offer subsidized insurance to cover for the loss of cattle like it does for the loss of crops.
Redding said he would look into the matter.
