WESTFIELD, Vt. — Longtime dairy farmer Lyle Edwards says he had been thinking about switching to organic for a few years out of frustration with federal milk policy.

The demise of a price support system that protected Northeastern farmers from fluctuating prices soon drove him to make the change.

"It was the only thing the dairy farmers had within the conventional milk system," he said of the six-state Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact. "Without that, it's all over, it's a matter of survival, really."

About 10 percent of the state's dairies — or 120 — are organic. By next year, that is expected to hit 20 percent.

Edwards hadn't used any synthetic fertilizers or pesticides and had kept his land free of herbicides for three years. He continued to graze his 50 cows as he always had, started feeding them organic grain and stopped using hormones and antibiotics.

In 2002, Edwards received his first payment of $20.75 per hundred pounds of organic milk, compared to about $12 per hundred pounds that conventional farmers got.

For other farms of similar size that have pastured their cows, the switch can be as simple. But for farms that are used to keeping their cows in the barn and feeding them grain, the transition can be more daunting.

Nationally, the organic dairy industry is expected to expand by 20 percent this year and an average of 15 percent each year from 2007 to 2010, according to the Organic Trade Association.