So much has been made about the rising price of gas, but
milk prices unfortunately aren' too far behind the
staple of so many meals for Americans is already in
transition with more and more people opting to purchase
non animal milk already 10-15% of milk sold is nut or
soy based and now there's actually a push for a new
milk alternative joining us now is florida University
Associate professor Garrett Broad, He's written in
research developments in the dairy industry. He joins
us now live to tell us about a so called milk. So
Garrett thanks so much for being with us this morning.
It's a pleasure to be here. Thanks. It's great to see
you again. So, Garrett, listen, I was researching this
during the break and I see that there are tons of milk
products out there on the market right there. Milk
products made with hemp seeds, macadamia, nuts, cashews
piece even potatoes. So what exactly is this new
product How is it made exactly So there is a long
history of dairy alternatives. The number that you've
mentioned there, this is something new, This is
something different. This is not plant based milk. The
idea is, we're calling it an animal free dairy. It uses
a combination of some new school technology and old
school technology to actually gen genetically engine
microbes to create milk protein that then get put into
big fermentation bioreactors and then create actual
animal milk protein just like the real thing, but
without any animals involved. So again, it's sort of
old school new school genetic engineering plus
fermentation to create real milk protein without the
cap. Well what is behind all of this, you're saying
it's animal free dairy, why And more importantly, what
does it taste like It sounds kind of scary, it sounds
like a giant science experiment. Yeah, so there ther
are actually some products that are already on the
market in the United States, you can buy some ice cream
by a company called Perfect Day and some of their
partners. Um it tastes like real dairy because it is
real dairy. Um It is uh what what's behind it are a lot
of folks who are interested in looking for other
alternatives, other options that maybe have better
environmental benefits than eit the real thing, the
conventional dairy or some of the existing alternatives
as well as match on taste. Uh And and you know, to the
extent that it it can fully match taste and texture o
the real thing. Uh This is still a really emerging area
and so we don't know for sure what consumers think o
Well, I'm gonna go ahead and play devil's advocate for
a moment because they do say that some highly processed
plant based milk is actually really bad for the
environment. So how is this sustainable So again, this
is going to be a different category than the pla
based milk. Um And that means it has different
environmental impacts as well, that the big critique of
conventional dairy of course, is it requires lots and
lots of animals. Lots and lots of cows in the case of
cow milk. Um and they have significant environme
impacts when it comes to methane emissions when it
comes to water pollution, as well, as of course,
ethical concerns about the treatment of animals within,
particularly within sort of highly intensive industrial
animal factory farming. So this theoretically could
remove the cow, remove some of those environmental
concerns, remove some of those ethical concerns, but
that doesn't mean it's perfect either. And we still
have a long way to go to be able to demonstrate the
actual gains, the actual environmental positives
this, these products, it's still going to require
energy, it's still going to require some sort of crops
to feed the cells that then get created in these
bioreactors. There's, I think some real reason to
believe that removing cows from this system could have
positive environmental impacts, it's going to be up
to the industry, it's gonna be up to researchers to
demonstrate that to prove that. And then, of course,
again, to prove to consumers that it's worth eatin
it's worth drinking, it's worth consuming. Um and
that's going to be the real test on the market, I don't
know, I don't know, you know, for some cow's milk will
always be the gold standard for for my son especially.
So options is what I think a lot of folks are looking
to provide here. Thanks so much. Alright, appreciate it
Good to see you fordham University Associate Pr
Garrett Broad. Thanks for joini us. Hope to see you
again soon.