Shira Lane

Shira Lane

The economy is chomping down on every sector, everyone is getting hit one way or another- I too have lost properties, cut back significantly and finding myself just barely keeping my head afloat, yet the harsh truth is we NEEDED this breakdown as a big time wakeup call.

 

These last years have been a whirlwind of hot air, and now, creative ways of business need and should emerge to create a sustainable economy, planet and ecosystem. That, my friends, is what ought to be the focus in order to straighten out this financial disorder and not a stupid quick fix (Bailouts) that will burn bridges, tenfold, down the road. For obvious reasons let’s take the dairy industry as an example:

Dairy Industry is in trouble:

1.       The production cost of a gallon of milk is higher than the cost the dairy farmers sell it to the milk processors = farmer loss.  2008 production costs rose and the milk selling price has dropped = farmers loss even more and then some.

2.      Production costs are higher due to the increase of the feed, medications and quality control.

3.       The government has always subsidized the dairy farmers’ loss, creating an ongoing black hole for tax dollars.

4.      Throughout 2008 the dairy industry has requested an increase to the subsidized amount, to save a multitude amount of dairy farmers from closing down dairies. Due to the current economy state of affairs they have been turned down.

5.        Small family owned dairy farms are becoming extinct. Large corporations are overtaking and creating massive dairy farms of 5,000 – 15,000 cows per dairy.

6.      With so many cows, it becomes hard to tend to each cow individually, and so higher rates of transmittal diseases become present, increasing the requirement and quantity for additional drugs.

7.       These drugs lower the quality of the milk and in many cases unsellable to the American market.

8.      Therefore the beverage has lost its appeal to the public. Repetitive contamination warnings, artificial hormone injections, illegal amounts of antibiotic residue found in milk and constant up rise of studies linking milk to diseases like: Cancer, Childhood diabetes, heart disease and Osteoporosis, the public’s interest in milk alternatives amplified.

9.      More alternative choices (Soy, Almond, Hazelnut, Rice, Oat and Hemp milk) are now available in most stores.

10.   Lactose intolerance has found its way into mainstream familiarity. Now recognized and quickly diagnosed, has added weight to the fashionable stray from dairy products.

11.   International sales and exports plummeted.

Dairy industry is trying to fix the plunge the same way is has for years

1.       Increase lobbying for more lax policies for international trade and export.

2.      Persist to prohibit labeling milk that differences milk from cows injected by rBGH and those that haven’t.

3.       Convince developing countries, which have never been exposed to cow’s milk that they need to start drinking it.

4.      Amplify marketing, amplify marketing & amplify marketing.

5.       Escalate funding towards the ADA (Americans Dietician Association) to expand the command over the ADA curriculum and certification exams.

6.      Continue to enforce milk to be sold at schools, a requirement (placed by the dairy industry) to be considered for the School Lunch Program.

Dummies! Instead of realizing that this industry isn’t going in the right direction, not for the farmers, not for the economy, not for the environment, not for the government and certainly foremost not for anyone’s health, they are continuing to dig themselves deeper and deeper into it.

Farmers, people, citizens, aliens, government officials and all others – I am no genius, but here is an idea…Put all that money into changing the dairy industry into a sustainable industry where things can grow. We hit a wall sometimes because the universe wants us to take another direction. How about growing beans, nuts and legumes or building solar farms.

The options and technology are out there we simply need to engage our brain and make smart moves from this. We have lost a lot, let’s not lose the lesson.

Shira Lane

Director / Producer of
“Got the facts on Milk?”