THE BIG INTERVIEW

Fermanagh man Rodney Elliott uprooted his young family to build a mega dairy in the American Midwest, writes

THREE years after selling up the home farm in Fermanagh, Rodney Elliott’s dream 1,500 cow dairy farm was losing a million dollars.

For most Irish farmers, it’s the nightmare scenario. You’ve bet the farm — literally — on a new venture and it’s going down the tubes, all because milk markets nose-dived for 11 months in 2009.

“I was dreading visiting the bank,” admits the gregarious Northerner when he recalls that period.

“But when I got in there, they told me I was doing grand because I was only losing $400/ cow, compared to the average of $650,” he grins.

Elliott can afford to grin all the way to the bank these days. After weathering that short downturn, he entered a period when milk prices hit record highs. Milk price averaged about €0.47/l for about 11 months in 2014.

“We probably made the equivalent of 10 year’s profit that year, and it allowed us to build the 2,300 cow extension that cost $4.5m out of cashflow,” he says.

Such are the vaguries of modern day milk production in the US. Nobody starts small, with 1,000 cows the smallest start-up dairy units in states like South Dakota where the Elliotts emigrated in 2006.

At a present day cost of €5,500 per cow, that equates to an upfront investment of €5.5m. Then you need to be able to cope with the swings from massive losses to even bigger gains.

“You need a war-chest - what we call an equity position - to work your way through the 8-10 month price troughs,” says Rodney.

You must also have a lot of nerve. Elliott’s jolly demeanor belies a steeliness that saw him eschew the safety net of locking in most of their milk at middle-of-the-road prices after the disaster of 2009.

“We were able to capitalise on the fact that the global dairy cupboard was empty in 2014 because traders had sold everything and left no reserves,” recalls Rodney.

But he also played the game the other way too when in 2015 he locked in at basic price of $21/cwt — the equivalent of €0.42/l.

As a result of those two bumper years, the original 1,500 cow dairy has trebled in size to a 4,500 cow operation on a 300ac site.

The figures are boggling — the two cow sheds cover an area of over 10ac in shallow sloping roofs that allow the powdery snow to blow off easily, thus preventing them caving in under the weight of snow accumulation.

The silage pit that occupies the space between the two sheds holds 75,000t of maize and alfalfa silage.

The parlours hum day and night, with cows milked three times a day by a mix of Central and South American nationalities - mostly Mexican, Nicaraguan, and Porto Rican.

“Immigration is a very hot topic here, but most US citizens don’t realise that there would be no food on the supermarket shelf within about three days if the 12 million illegal migrant workers were deported,” remarks Rodney, who is quick to stress that all his 50 staff are fully legal.

“Once you get the cows right, it becomes all about managing