Big Dairy Battling Vegan Industry in Butter-Labeling War
The Wisconsin’s Department of Agriculture instructed retail food establishments to remove products that aren’t complying with the statutory definition for butter, which requires that it be made from milk or cream.
DEENA SHANKER: ‘Until recently, the U.S. dairy industry had been relatively quiet about the proliferation of non-dairy products that use words like “milk” or “cheese.” But lately it’s been pushing back. Wisconsin, which calls itself America’s Dairyland, is one of the biggest dairy producers in the country. It’s also America’s biggest maker of actual butter. So when it came to the kind of “butter” Miyoko Schinner makes, Wisconsin and its powerful dairy lobby decided to draw the line… A Japanese immigrant, Schinner started a small company that blossomed into a wildly successful vegan cheese maker, one with the potential to do for dairy alternatives what Beyond Meat is doing for beef substitutes…
Entrepreneurs such as Schinner have been riding a wave of popularity for plant-based products, especially dairy alternatives. Plant-based milk retail sales totaled $1.8 billion for the year ending May 25, a 6.5% increase, according to data from Nielsen. Cheese substitute sales totaled $117 million, showing 17.4% growth. Cashew butters were up to $12.6 million, representing an uptick of 4.9%. Milk sales, meanwhile, have been suffering a multi-decade decline. In Wisconsin, the pain has been particularly acute. The state’s dairy farmers are exiting the industry at a rate of three a day as low milk prices persist and bankruptcies accumulate…
Such dire circumstances have led some in the dairy industry, most notably lobbying groups like the National Milk Producers Federation, to campaign against alternative dairy products—specifically their use of dairy terms on labels… On April 15, Wisconsin’s Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection instructed retail food establishments to remove products that aren’t complying with the statutory definition for butter, which requires that it be made from milk or cream. “By definition, a ‘vegan’ product … cannot be legally labeled and sold as butter,” the state said. Products can be labeled as imitation butter, imitation margarine, or vegetable oil spread—but not the real thing, according to the memo…
During the almost two months the removal order was in effect, Miyoko’s Kitchen said its products were pulled from at least one Whole Foods store in Madison and from the retail chain Skogen’s Festival Foods. Whole Foods declined to comment. While Festival Foods confirmed Schinner’s products had been removed from its stores, no other products were singled out, said Kayla Paul, quality assurance and regulatory affairs specialist for the chain… Schinner said she offered the state a solution: Her company would have stores affix stickers that say “vegetable spread,” if the state would approve it. But the state agriculture officials didn’t respond for more than a month, her company said. Then, they approved the label on June 12′. SOURCE…
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