"back story to glut of industrial milk needs telling"

Date:   1/6/2009 12:38:06 AM ( 15 y ago)

"back story to glut of industrial milk needs telling
Posted by: "Gordon S. Watson"
Sun Jan 4, 2009 11:48 am (PST)

http://buzz.yahoo.com/article/pub/http%253A%252F%252Fwww.opednews.com%2\

52Farticles%252FIs-it-time-especially-dur-by-Linn-Cohen-Cole-090103-282.\
html




This is a very good
article by Andrew Martin who has been wonderful about providing in depth
stories on farming to the New York Times. But given the economy and the
raids going on across the country against non-corporate raw milk dairy
farmers,

it would make an exceptionally interesting piece to see those raids put
into the context of what is happening to dairy farmers across the
country, since raw milk dairy farmers exist within a completely
different set of economies involving grass-fed cows and milk sold only
locally, avoiding any corporate middleman, export issues, or the
drastically rising cost of inputs for corn and soy. Martin's story is
describing only the industrial side and gives a window into the whole
mess of globalization of milk. And while it is not mentioned, one can
feel in the background, the impact of Monsanto's monopoly over grains,

click here


The story is of glut and large swings in the
market and farmers being knocked around in it all. Meanwhile, at a local
level (the level we say we are most interested in developing and
protecting), there is growing demand for raw milk and there is actual
safety for the farmer within a local economy (as well as for the
consumer), ESPECIALLY during hard times.

Mr. Martin didn't mention of rBGH click here


which is also Monsanto's legacy to all this glut of milk (even if they
recently sold it). While there is huge resistance against rBGH-milk
here with some concerned about its link to breast cancers, prostate
cancers, colon cancers. So, are we exporting diseases to countries
which have previously had low levels of breast cancer. How much is
corporate advertising and fast food multinationals responsible for
demand for milk and ice cream and cheeses in countries that never
depended on dairy to begin with? What has this done to health in these
countries? 'The bags of milk powder represent a startling reversal of
fortune for the dairy industry, which flourished in recent years in part
because of a growing appetite for milk, cheese, ice cream and pizza in
places like Mexico, Egypt and Indonesia.' ...
'Much of the increase was caused by increased demand in developing
countries, where a growing middle class replaced starch in their diets
with protein sources like meat and dairy products. Some Asian countries
had little history of eating dairy products but were introduced to milk
and mild cheeses by government nutrition programs or by restaurant
chains like McDonald's
and Pizza Hut.'

Was our government responsible for getting milk introduced into those
nutrition programs as part of "free" trade agreements?

'In China, for instance, per-person dairy consumption nearly doubled in
just five years, to 63 pounds in 2007 from 33 pounds in 2002 (though it
remains far below the per-capita consumption in the United States of
about 580 pounds), according to the U.S. Dairy Export Council. The
growth translates into the need for nearly 40 billion pounds more milk
each year, roughly equal to California's annual milk production.

'In addition to the increased demand, exports from the American dairy
industry benefited from a relatively weak dollar and tight global
supplies. For instance, droughts reduced milk production in New Zealand
and Australia, two major dairy exporters, allowing American suppliers to
fill the gaps.

'American dairy shipments soared to places like Algeria, Bangladesh,
Indonesia and the Philippines. The biggest market, however, was Mexico,
where imports from America increased to $853 million in 2007 from $258
million in 2003, according to the Agriculture Department." The EU isn't
listed. Is it still the case that the EU won't touch our milk products
because of rBGH despite Bill Clinton leaning on them heavily to do so?
/divdivspan>
Clinton even pushed Codex to set a standard to allow for
rBGH.

'By refusing to set a standard today, Codex has recognized that there is
no consensus on rbGH safety in the international scientific community,
and that national governments should be able to decide whether rbGH
should be permitted in their milk supply,' said Jean Halloran, Director
of the Consumer Policy Institute at Consumers Union. 'The U.S. has
pushed Codex to adopt a standard to ensure the continued export of its
dairy products from cows treated with the rbGH drug. However,
U.S.-driven efforts to persuade the international community that rbGH is
safe have been blocked twice before at Codex, in 1995 and again in 1997,
primarily by opposition from European governments.'

Away from all the worries about rBGH and the international battles over
sovereignty and inputs of GMO-corn and GMO-soy, with prices controlled
monopolistically by Monsanto, local raw milk farmers are putting their
cows out to pasture and managing because customers are seeking them out
and paying them directly for their milk, enough for the farmers to make
a living. During this economic situation, they may need to retrench a
bit if customers do, or they might actually be in a good position since
milk is so basic a food. click here


Their input costs are very different, that's
for sure, since their main fed is grass out in the pasture.
I hope Andrew Martin and others will begin doing stories on the
disparities between an industrial farming system that is failing at
every level and a vibrant local farming system that is protective during
such times as we are going through, versus the complexity, high input,
low prices and helplessness for dairy farmers in the industrial
globalized system. Martin and others in the media need to highlight
farm raids and what the USDA is doing to intentionally destroy local
farmers - or shall we say 'sustainable agriculture'? - who pose a threat
to corporate processors in not needing them, in, in fact, surviving
because they are doing without them. Obama campaigned in support of
sustainable agriculture. His selection of a Monsanto's man Vilsack is a
massive betrayal of those campaign promises and of our farmers who are
clearly in trouble. Vilsack was dreamed up anti-democratic laws that
remove from communities AND FARMERS the right to keep GMOs out of their
area, and he supports genetic engineering of crops though it comes with
patents that turn farmers into tenant farmers on their own land since
they aren't allowed to collect seeds and end by only renting them, and
though it uses 8-10 more petroleum-based pesticides than normal - that
is, oil. It is, on an economic-level, about monopoly in farming, about
increased demand for oil and about sowing global warming, seed by seed.
That is another back story to the industrial milk glut that needs
telling. The industrial morass needs to placed alongside questioning
why our tax-payers dollars are going to fund USDA raids against horse
and buggy Mennonite farmers - traditional local dairy farmers whose
customers love them and come out to protest raids against and who hold
fund raisers to try to compensate for 10s of 1000s of dollars in stolen
and dumped equipment and food - farmers who are practicing EXACTLY what
Obama says we must have - sustainable agriculture.

I just heard from a farmer in Virginia that a dairy farmer with a big
operation down the road from him, is closing down. Seems he says he has
never gotten more from the processors for his milk than he did back in
1970. That's the industrial story while we're paying the USDA as they
increasingly and violently attack and terrorize local farming - dairy
and otherwise - that is succeeding and is critical protection for all
of us during an economic meltdown.


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/02/business/02dairy.html?ref=business



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