Here is a link to a great article by Dr. Terry Etherton of Penn State. 200 milk samples from across the nation...purchased from ordinary stores. Test them for hormones, nutritional content etc. and what do you find? No difference among the milks. An NO antibiotics in any of them!
However, take the time, do the math, see how much money milk companies are scamming out of the public and the farmers who produce the milk. You will easily see the driving force behind all the hype. Pay careful attention to the way big milk companies pay activist groups to take unscientific stands on food politics that benefit sales of their products. Here at Northview we receive a $.20 per hundredweight premium for not using rBST. The company we sell it to makes around $18 extra dollars for that same milk. Yes, those decimal points are in the right place. Twenty cents. Eighteen dollars. For something that isn't chemically different in any way when it arrives at the store. No different hormones. No antibiotics. Nothing different at all. Is it any wonder that farmers get mad about it?
HT to Trent Loos
About Me
- threecollie
- Embracing agricultural diversity, one species at a time. All rights reserved
That's a great article IMO. It's clearly written, comprehensive, and supported by fact. I'm most impressed by the number and credentials of the scientists who co-signed it, many of whom I recognize from reading agricultural articles and journals over the years.
ReplyDeleteBut typical of our bloated, liberal society, the money will speak, and I have no doubt that everything-free milk will become the standard. So when milk is scarce (due to bankrupt farmers) and the available beverage is soy milk (gag) and the farms are grown up to brush or planted with houses, science will turn its efforts to trying to create a wholesome, tasty, nutritious substitute for fresh milk.
Thanks for sharing this article, and I, in turn, have shared it with my friends. -NW
NW, I really thought it was a good article and I am hoping for more good information from the source.
ReplyDeletethreecollie, it seems the “rBST-free” milk fight is raging in your neighborhood too. I've heard more of a fight from producers in the Midwest and Northeast about giving up this technology than we ever heard out here in the West about this topic a year ago. If people only knew how much more environmentally friendly these safe, approved technologies are for food production, they'd be irate for having to pay more for a gallon of milk that had to be produced using more fossil fuels and grain than necessary.
ReplyDeletePDeditor, thanks for stopping by and thanks very much for the link on your site. We receive your excellent magazine here on our farm and find it quite useful. I am not even really a fan of rBST, because we aren't exactly short of milk production here in the USA and I sure liked the price surge when the supply was curtailed. However, what therapeutic medicines will be next if we keel over on this one? Maybe oxytocin? A real lifesaver for cows after calving, but easy to paint in a bad light if the activists go after it next. If there was sound science behind all the hype it would be fine, but there just isn't.
ReplyDeletethreecollie,
ReplyDeleteYou are very active on the web. How do we get more of our agriculture friends active in blogging and the digital revolution?
Peditor, not sure really. Most ag bloggers seem to be small hobby farmers. There are a lot of ranch bloggers though and darned good ones. I suppose farmers are busy and perhaps not comfortable with the medium. I also write a small newspaper column for our local daily, on farm topics. I just like it. Thanks for visiting!
ReplyDelete