Petschar against vegan lobby

If the plans of multinational corporations and lobbyists have their way, milk and dairy products should no longer be the pure and unadulterated food that they always were. They want products manufactured artificially and on the basis of cheap substitutes to be allowed to be labeled and sold as milk, claims the Association of Austrian Milk Processors (VÖM).

“This would not only fool the consumer, it would also jeopardise sustainable milk production in Austria and our self-sufficiency with high-quality food,” said Helmut Petschar, VÖM president.

Milk, butter, yogurt, cream and cheese are currently legally protected terms, which must come from the milk of animals. The strict protection of names is intended to prevent misuse and, above all, to create clarity and security for consumers.

Milk and milk products contain a balanced composition of protein, fat and carbohydrates, as well as many valuable vitamins and minerals, eg, calcium. Due to their natural composition, they are nutritionally very high-quality and also strictly tested foods, they represent an important part of our diet.

That is why there are attempts to use the good image of milk for other products, but this is so far prohibited.

“The dairy industry is not concerned with banning plant-based products or making them bad, but it must be clear that these are something completely different and not dairy products, because they are based on completely different ingredients and processing steps”, underlined the VÖM president.

The outrage at the Austrian organisation is, because it sees that at the moment large, multinational food companies, in conjunction with the vegan lobby and some animal welfare organizations, are trying to overturn the protection of names for milk at EU level by trying to persuade EU parliamentarians to change the law to remove protection for milk products, so they can instead make products on the basis of cheap substitutes, which then could legally be called “milk”.

“That would be a hard blow against clear labeling! It would then no longer be apparent to consumers, what they are buying. But large multinational corporations could further increase their profits with cheap imitations and the good image of milk, because imitations are often much cheaper. Security of supply with very high-quality food in Austria and in the EU would fall by the wayside, as would all the additional services that the dairy industry provides for our country. Regrettably, this attack on consumers and farmers is also supported by organisations, which seem to be active in the environment or animal protection,” concluded Petschar.

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