Nutrition Research

Dietary Guidelines research 

• Led to 2010 Dietary Guidelines recognizing fat-free chocolate milk as a nutrient dense food that contains some added sugars
• Led to reporting that "intake of milk and milk products is associated with a reduced risk for cardiovascular disease and type II diabetes"
• Led to increase in dairy servings for children ages 4-8, from 2 to 2.5 cups daily  

Nutrient-rich research

• Created a nutrient rich food index for consumer education, guidance and labeling
• Established that white and flavored milk consumption is associated with positive nutrient intakes in children and adolescents and is not associated with weight gain
• Established a role for chocolate milk to stimulate recovery after exercise  

Product Research  

Reduced fat/reduced sodium cheese research

• Led to market testing of reduced sodium process American, white cheddar and pepper jack cheese at McDonald's
• Led to the development of consumer acceptable reduced-fat and reduced-sodium processed and natural cheeses
• Technology shared with several dairy marketing organizations; volume impact up to 800 million pounds of milk used in the school lunch program and elsewhere; reduced-fat, reduced-sodium process cheese projected annual use of 10 million pounds of milk

 Milk protein concentrate research

• Led to eight U.S. MPC manufacturers using 1.46 billion pounds of milk to make domestically produced MPC, which has displaced imported MPC

 Artisan/specialty cheese research

• Led to the development of several high-quality cheeses

Yogurt and specialty product research

• Led to companies developing Greek Yogurt, Kefir and Frozen Smoothies
• Specific examples (with annual milk use): Yoplait frozen smoothies which use milk ingredients (24 million pounds); Happy Melts™ Organic Yogurt Snacks for Babies and Toddlers (600,000 pounds); Yoplait Yogurt Dip (6 million pounds)

Pending IDEM environmental regulations will impact Dairy operations with 300 or more animals. There are several items in the proposed rule that will add long term compliance expense for many of IPDP's regulated members. When compared to the current CFO rule, in most cases, the proposed rule will hit CFO's harder than CAFO's. I will focus on two such items that have the most immediate and noticeable impact:

1. Virtually Eliminates Manure Application to Frozen or Snow Covered Ground:

• The proposed rule allows CFO's to apply manure to frozen or snow covered ground only on an emergency basis. In practice this means regulated IPDP members cannot rely on winter time spreading as part of their long term manure management operations. Even when they can winter time spread in an environmentally sound manner, they will eventually incur the cost of expanding manure storage so winter time spreading does not occur.
• Both the existing CFO rule (at 327 IAC 16-10-3) and CAFO rule (at 327 IAC 15-15-14) allow manure application on frozen or snow covered ground subject to specific management plan conditions. IDEM has no supportable basis to abandon the existing provisions and create a blanket prohibition on frozen ground application. The rule should be revised to allow land application on frozen or snow covered ground in accordance with existing CFO rule conditions.

  2. Manure Application Rates Based on Phosphorus not Nitrogen:

• The proposed rule will eventually require all CFO's to limit manure application based on phosphorus content not nitrogen content. Under the proposed rule manure cannot be applied to a field with a soil test of greater than 200 ppm phosphorus, even when manure can be applied to that field with little or no known environmental risk. For many IPDP members, this will lead to immediate operational changes. Many producers will need to reduce manure application rates in half to meet phosphorus limits and as a practical result, will incur costs associated with needing twice the amount of acres used for manure application. In some cases, purchase of supplemental nitrogen fertilizer will be necessary due to an application rate based on phosphorus not nitrogen. This too will add costs.
• Indiana is not required by EPA to add phosphorus application limitations to its CFO regulations. I am not suggesting that phosphorus is not a concern, but there are already two existing mechanisms in Indiana to address manure application and phosphorus issues: the Office of the State Chemist, and IDEM's Watershed Planning Branch. IDEM's proposed phosphorus standard is a third mechanism to address phosphorus concerns. In accordance with the Governor's commitment to reduce burdensome regulations on business, do we need to maintain or expand a third mechanism to manage phosphorus?
• There is no flexibility in the proposed phosphorus rule. Every field is different. A producer should have the ability to make a site specific demonstration that an alternate soil test phosphorus number would be equally protective of the environment.
• How does this regulation benefit the environment and at what cost? The provisions regarding land application of phosphorus will eventually burden most farms with a known measureable compliance expense.   It is unknown whether that cost will result in equal or greater economic benefit. Soil erosion and conservation management practices also play a role-indeed, may play a bigger role-in reducing phosphorus impact on surface water. This is why I suggested above, that we focus on the two mechanisms in place already that will give us a bigger bang for the buck compared to the proposed IDEM phosphorus standard.