§ 258-k. Declaration of policy. For the purpose of implementing the
provisions of section two hundred fifty-eight-k through section two
hundred fifty-eight-n of this article, it is hereby declared that the
dairy industry is a paramount agricultural industry of this state and
the normal processes of producing and marketing milk have become an
enterprise of vast economic importance to the state and of vital
interest to the consuming public which ought to be safeguarded and
protected in the public interest; that it is the policy of this state to
promote, foster and encourage the intelligent and orderly marketing of
milk through producer owned and controlled cooperative associations and
to promote, foster and encourage as an incident of such marketing, the
maintenance, by such associations, jointly or in cooperation with other
cooperative associations of programs designed, by means of advertising,
publicity, education or otherwise, to promote increased demand for and
consumption of milk and dairy products; that unfair, unjust and
destructive demoralizing trade practices have been and are likely to be
carried on in the production, sale, processing and distribution of milk
and that it is a matter of public interest and for the public welfare
for the state to promote the orderly exchange of commodities and in
cooperation with the federal government or other states in the
regulation of interstate commerce, to take such steps as are necessary
and advisable to protect the dairy industry and insure an adequate
supply of milk for the inhabitants of this state; that for such purpose
public interest requires, as necessity therefor has arisen or may arise,
the fixing of prices of milk to be paid to producers and associations of
producers where there has been or is a disruption of orderly marketing
of milk in any marketing area by reason of surpluses or by reason of
unfair, unjust or destructive trade practices, that in order to make
such price-fixing effective it is necessary that the benefits of the
fluid market and the burden of, and the expense of, handling of
surpluses, be shared equally by all producers of milk for the marketing
area and to this end that dealers not handling their proportionate share
of the surplus shall as part of the price of their milk make payments to
a fund to equalize the prices of milk to producers and to share the cost
of handling surplus so as to remove one of the principal causes of price
demoralization.