If manure smells like money -- and in February 2012 the commodity markets say it does -- then Sioux County is one of the wealthiest places in America.Truckloads of cows and pigs rumble south every day on Highway 75 on their way to slaughterhouses in Omaha and Dakota City, Neb. Profit flows back into the towns of Rock Valley, Hull, Sioux Center and Orange City.

Cooperatives Working Together has accepted 17 requests for export assistance from Bongards, Dairy Farmers of America, Darigold, Michigan Milk Producers Association and United Dairymen of Arizona.

The largest losses came from herds with 50 to 99 cows, down 1,000 herds.

Proposed policy would impose an entirely new regulatory burden on dairy processors to enforce a new program to periodically limit milk production, she says.