It started with a innocent question on Twitter: has butter in Canada become harder to distribute?
“My butter just looked harder. It was during a very hot period and I noticed that it was not acting properly, ‘said Sylvain Charlebois, a professor of food distribution and policy at Dalhousie University. “But I thought I was the only one experiencing it.”
He quickly learned that he was not alone.
Julie Van Rosendaal, a cookbook author, was one of many others who posted to describe a mysterious transformation in the food pantry. “There’s something wrong with our butter supply,” she wrote.
The growing suspicion that the guilty palm oil extracts may have caused a nationwide uproar, and as questions arise, the case has long rekindled grievances over the country’s powerful dairy industry – and accusations that its policies are hurting Canadians with higher costs taxed to protect farmers.
‘Butter is probably two or three times more expensive in Canada than in the United States. And as Canadians, we have implicitly agreed to this, ”Charlebois said. ‘But we also expect quality. Regardless of what causes harder butter, people really wonder what’s going on here. And they question the lack of transparency of the dairy industry. ”
For years, Canada has strictly controlled the production of milk, butter and cheese through supply management – a complex system of production controls and tariffs designed to discourage foreign imports and keep local prices stable.
Under the system, farmers receive the same amount of money for their product every month.
During trade negotiations with the US, Donald Trump waged a fitness against the system and unsuccessfully asked Canada to dismantle its long-standing protectionist measures.
Charlebois believes the system is largely responsible for the current row over butter quality.
“Regardless of the quality of your product, regardless of what takes place on your farm, you get the same amount of money. That is why farmers in Canada are probably the best cost managers in the world when it comes to dairy products, ”said Charlebois. “How do you actually produce more fat while keeping costs as low as possible? Well, palmitic acids are a very easy solution. ‘
Palm oil extracts have long been used in the dairy industry to increase milk production and the fat content of the milk. Charlebois and other experts suspect that the growing demand for butter – exacerbated by the pandemic – has led more producers to use the practice.
There is still no clear explanation as to why Canadians are noticing a change in their butter, but Charlebois points to an October report by British Columbia’s dairy marketing council, which expressed concern about the lack of foam in milk – and said that the issue “has increased rather significantly since the end of August” – and called on producers to be vigilant. The observations made by the council, he said, are consistent with the presence of palm oil extracts.
The dairy farmers of Canada initially rejected concerns about a change in butter quality.
But as concerns grew and Le Journal de Montréal published allegations that more farmers admitted to using palm extracts while feeding their herds, the lobby group issued a follow-up statement saying that although palm products are sometimes added to the ration of dairy cows. have a very limited impact on the palmitic acid profile of their milk.
The dairy farmers of Canada have said that the practice of adding palm extracts to cow feed is common in the United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Australia.
However, La Presse reported on Wednesday that the council of dairy industries in Quebec has called for the immediate cessation of the use of palm oil in cow feed.
In addition to questions about the long-term health consequences of palm oil and its devastating impact on the environment, Charlebois said the opaque response is just as disturbing.
‘Milk and butterfat should be considered public goods because of our government quota system. “There is a moral contract between the dairy industry and consumers,” he said.
As Canadian taxpayers would pay C $ 1.75 billion in subsidies over the next three years, mainly as compensation for greater global access to domestic markets, Charlebois said questions about the quality of butter meant the moral contract had been broken.
Previous debates over the country’s supply management have often been riddled with angry policy issues, but Charlebois said this time it looks different.
‘People understand that butter should not destroy toast in the morning. And they also know that palm oil is bad. People understand those things. And that’s why I think people are a little shocked at what they’re hearing now. ‘