As you might expect, you’ll hear plenty of both pros and cons about the Fibrominn plant in Benson, and what it’s doing to the Minnesota turkey litter market.

“It’s a damn joke,” said one long-time Renville County turkey producer who requested anonymity. “The only ones to benefit are the owners of this new plant, and some top management people. ... This turkey litter is like gold for the land. Why throw it away by burning it to produce electricity? We know who eventually pays the bill for this operation, and that will be the customers of Xcel Energy; in essence the people of Minnesota.”

He called the usage of turkey manure to produce electricity a marketing ploy, where somebody is pulling the wool over someone else’s eyes. He maintained that taxpayers also pay for the trucking of the litter, suggesting the cost of hauling it to Benson is more than what the product is worth.

He accepts the business reality that this project happened because of a Minnesota state mandate with Xcel energy, but believes this is an expensive way to generate electricity, especially from a product that he contends is worth far more when applied to the soil as an agricultural fertilizer.

“Yes, we can now charge more for our turkey litter because Fibrominn has in fact created a new, competitive market for the product.” The Renville-county producer grows about 180,000 turkeys annually and said the turkey market today is “OK” compared to what it has been, “but the growers aren’t getting it — the profits go to Jennie-O, Sara Lee and the other processors.”

He thinks turkey litter today should be worth $25 a ton spread on the field. That involves handling the litter twice, plus the field application. “Yes, it takes a lot of work, time and special equipment, which includes incorporating it into the soil when applied,” he said. Actual data from the University of Minnesota Agronomy Department indicates a ton of turkey litter has 66 pounds of nitrogen, 60 pounds of phosphorous and 33 pounds of potash.

Who’s raising the turkeys

According to the Minnesota Turkey Growers Association, there are about 250 turkey producers in Minnesota raising turkeys on about 600 farm locations, but ownership of these birds is difficult to pin down. Much like the hog industry, now nearly 90 percent “contract grown” by huge entities such as Sleepy Eye-based Christiansen Farms, the turkey industry also is mostly a contract operation with Jennie-O (owned by Hormel Foods) and Sara Lee of Storm Lake, Iowa, controlling many of the birds.

The only open processing markets in Minnesota are Northern Pride, a grower’s cooperative at Thief River Falls, and Turkey Valley Farms of Marshall, independently owned by a group of western Minnesota turkey farmers. In addition, Nebraska Turkey Growers in Gibbon, Neb., processes a few Minnesota-grown turkeys.

Steve Olson, MTGA executive director, said ownership of the Minnesota turkey industry’s 45 million birds is about equally divided three ways: A) company-owned barns and birds, primarily Jennie-O; B) contract grown for a specific grower where the farmer owns the barns, the birds and the litter; and C) true independents owning barns, birds, equipment, the turkey litter produced in their barns, and the privilege of marketing their birds wherever they select.

Olson said litter from the company-owned barns can travel various directions, including, of course, to Fibrominn in Benson. The “caretaker” of a particular company barn may also have a deal where he can use the litter on his land, or buy it and resell it to neighbors.

Jennie-O is the second-largest processor of U.S.-grown turkeys, only slightly behind the nation’s No. 1 processor, Butterball, which recently merged with Carolina Turkey. Olson said Minnesota is No. 1 in the nation in turkey production — North Carolina is second — and also has the largest number of independent growers.

Who’s happy out there?

A Waseca County farmer, also requesting anonymity, said that reports indicating turkey farmers are happy about Fibrominn don’t explain who those turkey farmers are. He claimed people pleased about this new market outlet most likely are with Jennie-O and other major processors because now they no longer need to deal with county regulations regarding the handling of turkey litter.

“It’s certainly not the farmer who is paid $18,000 a year to raise a barn full of turkeys,” the producer said. “We have a great resource here that is now going to waste.”

He regularly uses turkey litter on his fields, purchasing from turkey growers in his neighborhood. Relating to the legislative action that precipitated the mandate with Xcel Energy, he recalled the increasing concerns about the turkey industry and the handling of turkey litter — where to spread, when to spread, does it need to be soil incorporated, etc.

With Fibrominn now the potential “end-user” of millions of tons of this product, environmental issues are greatly minimized for Jennie-O growers. If they have a contract with Fibrominn, load out and delivery are pre-assigned like clockwork.

“So not out of the need of properly directed environmental regulations but instead out of the requirements of a state-imposed mandate, the whole issue of proper handling of this important agricultural fertilizer instead sits squarely in the lap of Fibrominn and the contracts it holds with turkey growers,” the farmer said.

“(Turkey barns are) turned every 110 days and they have about three days to clean out that barn before the next batch comes in. Twice a year they just skim off the litter, after the third batch it’s a total clean-out. And I was told about 220 tons from each skim, and about 450 tons from that full clean out. So you’re getting about 900 tons per barn per year.

“They, be it Jerome Foods or whomever is your contractor, covers all costs; you (the farmer) provide the labor for managing that barn for a year for which they were paying the farmer $18,000 per year. Included in that labor fee was about two hours per barn each day, one hour in the morning to throw out the dead birds and one hour in the afternoon with a lawn mower rigged with Danish teeth that tilled the top three to four inches of litter to keep the shavings dry.”

But after all of that input from the farmer, he does not own the manure — the contractor does. If that grower, or another local farmer, wants to buy the litter, he must deal directly with the contractor.

A Jennie-O spokesperson said that independent turkey producers make their own decisions about how they dispose of the litter from their barns. Obviously, Jennie-O decides how to dispose of litter from their company-owned farms. When asked if Fibrominn represents a new market for turkey litter that “more competitively” reflects the real value of this product, the spokesperson simply said turkey litter has always had value, whether it be as a fertilizer or energy.

The way it used to be

“Eight or nine years ago I was buying turkey litter for $4 to $5 a ton and that included spreading on your fields,” the Waseca County farmer said. “My turkey-growing neighbor appreciated me as a customer because I was close so hauling was a minor item. If they had to haul more than four to five miles from the barn, I believe the extra charge was 50 cents per mile. But in those days the grower had first rights to this litter, and if he couldn’t use it he had the right to find his own customers.

“But back in those days commercial fertilizer was relatively cheap so turkey litter was sort of a low-value product. Last year turkey litter was costing about $9 a ton, but that was not spread. If you were getting it spread, the cost was about $13 a ton.”

He said that a typical ton of turkey litter has 40 to 45 pounds N, 40 to 45 pounds phosphorous and about 40 pounds potash. He said that with contract production, if a local farmer wants to buy the turkey litter he must provide the skid loader and the trucks to haul, on the specific day decided by the contractor; if you don’t have the equipment, the litter will go to someone who does — like Fibrominn.

“So all of a sudden this right-to-buy of the local farmer is skewed,” said the farmer, a 10-year user of turkey litter who would like to continue using this product on his fields.

MTGA’s Olson said, however, that Fibrominn now provides a convenient alternative to growers lacking land space, or labor and equipment to handle turkey litter.

“There will be some tweaking for a few months yet to see how the supply-demand chain sorts itself out,” he said. “Handling this new ‘processed’ fertilizer maintains even more value, because there’s now less litter out there.”