Producer Perspective | T&C Louters

Tony Louters “never in a million years” thought he’d be a dairy farmer. He actually went to school to be a CPA, but an uninspiring internship during his senior year of college had him searching for a different career path. His wife’s family were dairy farmers, and he was interested.

“It looked like hard work, but also a great way to raise a family and had potential to be financially rewarding.” He began helping on his father-in-law’s dairy operation on the weekends before deciding to branch out a couple years later to start his own farm in Merced, California. “The rest,” he says, “is history.”

Tony is the kind of person who is always up for trying new things so he can explore what works best for his family and business. That openness led him to be one of the first producers to sign up with Athian after being approached by folks at his dairy co-op about his alternative manure management program (AMMP).

“Anything you can do to get different revenue streams going on a dairy, especially for doing the things you already have the set-up to do, makes sense,” he says. “I’d already put in all the equipment for AMMP, so to have the opportunity to get paid just taking down some data, it wasn’t really a difficult decision.”

Athian enables livestock producers to monetize their sustainability practices, which can help balance implementation costs or support the continuation of practices that wouldn’t otherwise be practical. By sharing key data through Athian’s secure platform to monitor progress, Athian then facilitates independent verification of the emissions reductions and their purchase for credible Scope 3 insets for food brands.

As one of the first participants in the Athian platform, teamwork was instrumental. Tony was able to provide suggestions on how things could be streamlined to make it simpler for his animal nutritionist, veterinarians and himself to input the data. And, he says the Athian team is easy to work with and helpful throughout the process.

As for the actual data sharing – of both historical and ongoing monthly inputs – Tony has no complaints.

“Overall, it was fairly user friendly,” Tony says. “Everything was easy to navigate, even for someone like me who isn’t super computer savvy.”

His work with Athian has sustainability benefits in more ways than one. In addition to protecting the environment, working with Athian is helping to provide financial sustainability for his farm.

“Farmers often get labeled with a bad rap, but I think we’re first-line environmentalists,” says Tony. “If I don’t protect my groundwater or protect my soil or protect the air well, guess what, I’m not going to be in business…but some of these sustainability practices come at a steep cost. Working with Athian absolutely helps us recoup some of those financial outlays to keep things going on our dairy for that sustainable, generational legacy.”

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