I’ve been fascinated/horrified/interested in this whole 4th of July Milk Dump that I wrote about on Friday. The coordinated dumping of hundreds of thousands of gallons hundredweights of milk took place on Sunday as planned in many locations. What follows is a little recap:
- This article details the happenings in Cement City, Michigan and supplies a proper noun for the whole thing, the Fourth of July Take Back Your Independence Day Dump.
- Here’s footage from Herkimer County, NY. In it, the events are called protests, which seems like an appropriate description.
- Friend of the Farmer wrote about the situation, including three suggested solutions.
- Syracuse’s ABC affiliate filed a story on the milk dumping.
- And here’s the local news segment from near Utica, New York, that I posted yesterday.
It’s certainly a complicated topic, but I have to say: it’s really hard to watch a stream of milk being poured onto the ground. A large part of me agrees with commenter Dave Skolnick: “Waste is Waste.” But I also think you can’t separate this event from the unsustainable situation dairy farmers face. What’s your take?
Comments
5 responses to “Waste in Sheep’s Clothing”
I just wish the news stories gave information for ways people can buy directly from the farm. They are only asking for about $1.50 a gallon for pete’s sake! I would buy directly from the farmer if I had the option and I think a lot of other people would too.
That would be nice, Beth. But I guess it’s on us to seek out local dairies that sell directly to customers. Where I live, it’s not too difficult, but I’m sure the availability of local milk varies greatly. Hopefully, what doesn’t vary is the steady supply of people willing to seek it out.
[…] Wasted Food — Jonathan Bloom on food waste and how it can be … […]
I think sometimes you need a little waste to cause a lot of change. One days worth of spilled milk seems like an easy price to pay relative to a host of out of work dairy farmers…
The question is: will one day’s waste make any difference? If not, is it justified? For me, it is, because these dairies aren’t able to donate their milk because it’s raw. And they can’t really pasteurize it and then donate it because the distributors they’re protesting are the ones who do the pasteurizing.