Shopping for dairy products in Canada is quite simple. In the U.S. it’s a whole different ball game. There are different varieties of milk, including organic.
Shop for milk and dairy products in European countries and you are in another world. You might even get a chuckle or a laugh.
There’s Hay Milk and Grass Milk in some countries. There’s Fair Milk. Organic Milk is a big seller. In Great Britain one company has renamed the Organic Farm Milk as Organic Free Range Milk to put more prominence on the free range claim. The dairy cows have to be outdoors for at least 180 days a year. People come to the farm to see the cows grazing, which helps the farmer’s bottom line.
In The Netherlands there are dairy products marketed as “Grassland-bird-friendly dairy products.” In 2016 Dutch video introduced the new pro-grassland bird’s dairy brand Weide Weelde (Rich Meadow). The milk is produced by farmers who support meadow birds. Sizable parts of pastures are mowed later than usual and they have a higher water level, giving flowers and herbs the chance to grow in abundance. Partly due to the flowery meadows the cows eat a more varied menu and consumers can taste that in the milk, says the promotion material I looked at. The new dairy brand is an initiative of the Farmers’ Guild, supported by BirdLife in the Netherlands.
In Switzerland and Austria you can buy organic milk and hay milk. There is a difference. Fifteen percent of Austria’s milk is organic and 15 percent is hay milk. Austria has many small dairy farms that milk an average of 18 cows. In summer the cows graze on pastures, in winter they are fed only hay and cereals. The cows do not get silage-feed. Less than three percent of the entire milk production within the European Union is silage-free. Therefore, the daily-fresh hay-milk of Alp dairy farms is a real rarity, according to the milk plant promotions. Because of the special feed for the cows the price for the milk is considerably higher than for conventional milk.
Then there’s Fair Milk. Prices received by dairy farmers for their milk have steadily fallen since 2001. Tens of thousands of farmers have stopped dairy farming — with dire consequences for many regions in Europe. It is with this aim that dairy farmers in many countries across Europe have joined forces, creating the European Milk Board. In Switzerland, farms that produce Fair Milk get 13 cents more per kilogram than regular milk.
In Great Britain there is now milk with the RSPCA Assured logo on it. It stands for Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Welfare standards for dairy cows have to be met for milk to be labelled this way.
Consumers are dictating how farmers treat their land and their animals.
