A call to arms

“Error,” says a Chinese proverb, “will travel over half the globe, while truth is pulling on her boots.” The dairy industry is witnessing that now.

At precisely the moment when a critical mass of science is revealing that dairy is a natural whole-food with a wealth of health benefits – reduced risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease, lower blood pressure, healthy body weight – it faces a growing tide of new negatives, spawned by the digital revolution.

Osmosis is a scientific term used to describe the gradual process by which ideas are distributed and assimilated in society. The digital revolution and social media have enabled the osmosis of negatives about dairy on an unprecedented scale.

The bad news

Type the words “do we need dairy” into Google and you will find links to social media posts, magazine articles, and blogs which – at best – are not clear whether consuming dairy is a healthier choice than cutting it out of the diet.

Many more sources recommend that people drop dairy. Among the reasons are:

• Personal appearance (have better skin)
• Lose weight: incredibly, the myth that “dairy makes you fat” is easier to find than the science (which shows the opposite)
• Cancer: there’s no shortage of people ready to repeat the falsehood that dairy is linked to increased risk of cancer
• Cow’s milk “is not made for humans” – it is supposed to be for calves. I guess bees don’t make their honey for humans either so by this reasoning we should be cutting that out of our diets too
• Dairy is bad for the environment: criticism of dairy’s perceived lack of sustainability and its contribution to climate change is everywhere.

There are also documentaries that link both meat and dairy production and enumerate their negatives. Of these Cowspiracy, produced by Leonardo DiCaprio and released via Netflix, may be both the most influential and the most negative about dairy and the environment.

Academics in public health often don’t help either: a UK government body called Public Health England (PHE) caused astonishment recently by issuing dietary guidelines that halved the recommended daily intake of dairy products. Called the Eatwell guidelines, they recommend that dairy products should account for just 8% of an individual’s daily food intake, compared with 15% previously. The guidelines even classify soy “milk” as being a nutritionally valid alternative to cows milk. UK trade organisation Dairy UK described the decision as “baffling and disappointing”, pointing out that the change went against the prevailing scientific evidence.

If you aren’t sure whether you agree about the impact of these negatives, just remember that in the US non-dairy milks – such as almond milk – have already seized more than 12% of the entire liquid milk market, with most of the growth happening since 2012.

Europe on board

And while the world is used to Americans passionately embracing every dietary trend that comes along, even in European food cultures such as France, Spain and Portugal – where people have faith in their naturally healthy diet and pitied Americans and their crazy fads and bad foods – the idea is quietly growing that “dairy-free” might be a healthier and more sustainable choice. The increasing sales of non-dairy products prove it. In Spain sales of non-dairy product are rising at more than 30% annually, while milk consumption has fallen by 18% since 2000. Even in cautious Germany sales of non-dairy milks are up 20% annually.

There’s also some big money betting against dairy. Silicon Valley financiers, looking for new profits, are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in companies that aim to “mainstream plant-based nutrition” and disrupt established markets with non-dairy milks and yogurts, meat substitutes and egg replacers. Even Bill Gates has been getting in on the trend. They also spend huge sums of money on PR agencies to promote their agenda and disseminate and promote negatives around dairy. Their real motive is not human health, but to create businesses that they can float on the stock exchange for billions of dollars.

Many dairy executives assume that consumers mostly “just know” that dairy is naturally nutritious and that they won’t ever cut it from their diet, don’t we? But as a result of this complacency our industry is guilty doing a lousy job of communicating the many science-based health benefits of dairy. And while senior executives sit back and let opportunity pass by, the rising tide of negatives about dairy is slowly, quietly, eroding dairy’s position.

History shows that massive changes usually develop slowly, with clear warning signs, but that people ignore the growing number of small signs until it’s too late. The dairy industry must wake up, and soon, and get its act together on better communication and turns the tide on the negatives – before the “too late” moment is reached.