Tag: whole milk

NMPF Celebrates Senate Support for Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

The National Milk Producers Federation celebrated strong bipartisan Senate support for the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act as senators begin considering this critical legislation.   

In a Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry hearing held Tuesday to review the measure, committee members and panelists highlighted the role this bill could have in increasing student milk consumption and nutrition access while also potentially decreasing waste.  

“NMPF commends Sens. Roger Marshall, R-KS, and Peter Welch, D-VT, for advocating for our nation’s students to have more access to nutrient-rich dairy by allowing schools to offer whole milk with school meals,” NMPF President & CEO Gregg Doud said. “We know that Americans are under-consuming dairy products, and as we heard today, students have said they want the milk they are familiar with and that they find satisfying. For many students, that’s whole milk.” 

NMPF also thanks Chairman John Boozman, R-AR, and Ranking Member Amy Klobuchar, D-MN, for voicing their support for the bill. 

“We are grateful to Chairman Boozman and Ranking Member Klobuchar for convening today’s hearing, and we look forward to working with them and the bill’s bipartisan sponsors to move it forward,” Doud said. 

The House of Representatives is considering similar legislation led by House Agriculture Committee Chairman GT Thompson, R-PA, and Rep. Kim Schrier, D-WA. The bill was approved by the House Education & the Workforce Committee with bipartisan support Feb. 12, and it now awaits floor action. Similar legislation passed the House by an overwhelming bipartisan margin in 2023 but was not taken up in the Senate. 

Milk-Drinking is Having a Moment

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

The good news keeps coming for fluid milk.

According to year-end USDA data, fluid milk consumption, in a slow decline for the past five decades, increased in 2024. The 0.6% increase to 42.98 billion pounds is the first year-over-year gain since 2009. And unlike that year, it didn’t happen because low prices and a bad dairy economy prompted grocery stores to practically give it away. Milk prices are relatively high these days, and people are drinking more milk because… well, because they want to.

And the story isn’t just that they’re drinking more milk. It’s also about why they’re drinking milk, as well as what kind of milk they’re drinking.

Source: USDA. Note: Whole milk total includes flavored varieties. Flavored Reduced-Fat includes 2%, 1% and skim. Other Milk includes buttermilk. All categories include both conventional and organic milk.

Driving much consumer interest in real milk consumption is the awareness that it’s a protein powerhouse. And that’s only part of the unique package of essential nutrients milk has to offer that leaves over-engineered, nutritionally inferior plant-based substitutes in the dust. (Not to mention their many weird ingredients.)

Fluid milk’s gains are built on whole milk, also known as “the milk that tastes most like milk.” Not to begrudge lower-fat varieties — dairy farmers support whatever milk you choose, as long as it’s actual milk and not one of the misnamed beverages — but whole milk’s popularity shows just how intrinsically tasty dairy is, as well as how much more popular milk could be if it, say, were offered on a school lunch menu to children who drink it at home.

The increase also accentuates the lie of the plant-based imposters, which fell in sales for the third straight year. After years of their misinformation, painting their gains as inevitable, milk isn’t just getting back its market share — it’s adding to its already overwhelming preference in the marketplace. And no amount of over-processing of nut-of-the-moment re-engineering is going to change that.

And with that, it’s time for government policy to match consumer reality. The Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act (which you can support here) would bring whole and 2% back to schools, giving schoolkids access to the same popular, healthy varieties they drink at home. And FDA’s enforcement of its own rules on milk’s Standard of Identity (or congressional passage of the Dairy PRIDE Act), would do a lot to clear up consumer confusion over nutrition in the marketplace.

Milk has a lot of momentum heading into the year — which, really, just puts it in the same position as the rest of dairy, the popularity of which remains the highest it’s been since the 1950s. So really — literally — raise a glass to this today. Because the number of glasses being raised is only growing.

 

Science Makes the Case for Whole Milk, Teicholz Says

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

You don’t have to be part of the dairy sector to see how important whole milk is for children, best-selling author Nina Teicholz, Ph.D., said in the latest Dairy Defined Podcast.

That’s because nutrition science makes a compelling case for full-fat milk, underscoring the importance of getting whole milk back in schools, the goal of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act, she said.

Children who drink whole milk tend to be healthier, she said. “You need the fat in the milk to digest the vitamins that are in the milk, those are fat soluble vitamins. “I’m not a dairy advocate, but it turns out that the science supports the position of those of people in the industry who would prefer to see whole milk back in schools.”

Teicholz, author of “The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet,” also discussed how food policy might be shaken up by Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s. confirmation as Health and Human Services Secretary.

NMPF has a call to action supporting the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act for listeners who want to get involved, here. For more of the Dairy Defined podcast, you can find and subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music under the podcast name “Dairy Defined.”

NMPF Statement on Bipartisan Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act

Posted on by Rachel Ravencraft

From NMPF President & CEO Gregg Doud:

“NMPF commends House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn ‘GT’ Thompson, R-PA, and Rep. Kim Schrier, D-WA, for continuing to lead their bipartisan Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act to help increase kids’ access to milk’s vital nutrients.

“The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee reaffirmed in its Scientific Report last December that most kids and adolescents are not meeting daily dairy intake recommendations. Good nutrition is a cornerstone of children’s health and development, and milk plays an unparalleled role in providing the nutrients kids need to grow and thrive. But kids take more milk, and drink more milk, in school when they have nutrient-dense options they like. A growing body of scientific evidence shows that dairy foods at all fat levels have a neutral or positive effect on health outcomes, ranging from lower prevalence of obesity and diabetes to reduced heart disease risk and healthy cholesterol levels.

“We are grateful to the House Education and the Workforce Committee for approving the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act today on a bipartisan vote. It’s a critical step toward finally expanding the popular, healthy milk options schools can serve to improve student nutrition.”

NMPF’s Bjerga on Whole Milk, Lactose-Free Gains

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

 

Consumers are increasingly turning to whole milk, an important point to consider as Congress considers the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act, NMPF Executive Vice President Alan Bjerga says in an interview with Big Radio in Janesville, WI. Along with whole milk, consumers are also drinking more lactose-free varieties, an important part of the industry’s future.

NMPF Applauds Bipartisan Effort to Expand Students’ Access to Whole Milk

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

From NMPF President & CEO Gregg Doud:

“NMPF commends Representatives Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-PA, and Kim Schrier, D-WA, and Senators Roger Marshall, R-KS, Peter Welch, D-VT, Dave McCormick, R-PA, and John Fetterman, D-PA, for their leadership in boosting students’ access to crucial nutrition with their Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act. Just last month, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee reaffirmed that most Americans under-consume nutrient-dense dairy.  This much-needed bill lets schools offer students the healthful milk options that they are most likely to drink by permitting the serving of nutritious reduced fat and whole milk varieties, critically addressing kids’ under-consumption of milk’s essential nutrients.

“NMPF is ready to work with the bill’s bipartisan sponsors to move this commonsense, widely supported solution across the finish line this year.”

Whole Milk Ready for Breakthrough Year

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

With consumer choice, scientific research and congressional legislation all going its way, 2024 promises to be a breakthrough year for whole milk, NMPF’s Head of Nutrition Policy Claudia Larson and Regulatory Affairs Director Miquela Hanselman said in a Dairy Defined Podcast released today.

The variety that shoppers prefer is poised to return to school lunch menus given the bipartisan approval of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act in the House of Representatives, and it will figure prominently in consideration for updated federal Dietary Guidelines that are due next year.

“This is important to our students, this is important to our schools, this is important to our parents,” said Larson, a senior director of government relations at NMPF. “Reach out to your senators, let them know that this is important to you and your children in your community and ask them to please co-sponsor the bill.”

NMPF has a call to action urging lawmakers to support the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act here. The full podcast is here. You can also find the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Podcasts. Broadcast outlets may use the MP3 file below. Please attribute information to NMPF.

Whole and Lactose-Free Milk Shine Bright

Posted on by Alan Bjerga

By Alan Bjerga, Executive Vice President, Communications & Industry Relations, NMPF

This is shaping up to be an exciting year for both whole and lactose-free milk, two growing segments of fluid milk consumption that are poised for further gains in grocery aisles as well as Washington, D.C. policy circles.

First, the facts: Even as fluid milk continues its decades-long challenge of eroded consumption as beverage markets diversify and consumer preference shifts to other forms of dairy, both whole milk and lactose-free varieties are bucking that trend. According to data from Circana Inc., which tracks retail sales, whole milk sales rose slightly (up 8 million gallons, or 0.6%) in 2023 over 2022. Because overall fluid sales declined, whole milk now makes up 45.4% of total fluid volume sold and is easily the most popular variety.

Lactose-free milk, meanwhile, reached a milestone. By climbing 6.7% to 239.2 million gallons last year, it surpassed the sales volume of almond beverages, by far the most popular plant-based milk alternative beverage. Almond’s annual decline of 9.8% is a big part of an overall consumer move away from plant-based alternatives, which have now seen two straight years of sales volume drops. Buyers are emphatically rejecting years of misleading claims that these beverages are a worthy substitute to dairy.

What’s next?

The National Milk Producers Federation is pushing for full congressional passage of the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act, which overwhelmingly passed the House in December and stands good prospects of passage in the Senate — if the right legislative vehicle can be found in a jam-packed election year. Bringing whole and 2% milk back to school meal menus is a great way to improve the nutrition of the next generation of milk drinkers. We have a call to action on our website urging senators to take up the bill.

Lactose-free milk is becoming the industry’s spearhead in ensuring equitable access to milk across diverse populations in federal nutrition programs. It is simply asinine federal policy to do what some vegan activists are proposing — increase access in federal programs to plant-based beverages that are both nutritionally inferior and now falling out of favor with consumers — when a beverage exists that circumvents lactose intolerance and offers all of milk’s benefits because it is, after all, milk. You will be hearing more about this in upcoming months as we strive to make 2024 a year when people become more broadly aware of just how critical lactose-free milk can be for effective and fair nutritional choices.

In what’s been a challenging time for the industry, what can the success of whole and lactose-free milk tell us? It shows that, for all the proliferation of alternatives, consumers like milk that’s most like milk, in taste and composition. They also like milk that’s accessible for everyone who wants its benefits. Quality and diversity are promising building blocks for a prosperous future. That’s plentiful in dairy, and this year, what consumers are choosing also can inform better federal policy.

This column originally appeared in Hoard’s Dairyman Intel on Jan. 18, 2024.

Milk’s Lead Rises as Plant-Based Beverages Sink

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

The final numbers are in, and they confirm what we’ve anticipated all year. In 2023, consumers emphatically turned away from plant-based beverages at an accelerating rate that caused the category to lose market share to milk, where whole milk and lactose-free varieties are thriving and surpassing their competitors.

The numbers give even more reason to put a stake in all that overprocessed hype – and to push even harder for integrity in labeling beverages that are being abandoned by consumers tired of inferior alternatives to dairy.

With full year data now available from Circana Inc., which tracks grocery-store spending, plant-based beverage consumption in 2023 fell 6.6 percent to 337.7 million gallons. It’s the second straight year of declines and the lowest consumption since 2019.

Sales volumes for almond drinks, the biggest plant-based category, fell 10 percent, and the soy beverages that vegan activists weirdly want in school lunches declined 8 percent. Even the once-Next-Big-Thing, oats, only rose 1.4 percent last year.

Sorry, Oatly – the froth has left your latte, and all that’s left is the drain.

Meanwhile, fluid milk – the real kind – keeps chugging away. To be fair, like plant-based, its consumption also declined, and like plant-based, its sales volume number starts with a 3. However, that 3.137 is followed by the word billion – not million, which is where plant-based is stuck – and the drop was 2.7 percent, less than half the rate of decline for plant-based beverages. That means fluid milk last year lengthened its lead over plant-based. In 2022, fluid milk had 89.9 percent of the pie. In 2023, it rose to 90.3 percent.

Beyond the overall number, fluid milk had more good news. Sales of whole milk, the most popular variety (and the one we need back in schools), rose last year, and lactose-free milk – the one tailor-made for people with dairy sensitivities – jumped 6.7 percent to 239.2 million gallons. With that, lactose-free milk surpassed almonds; it’s now a bigger category on its own than any plant-based alternative.

(You’ll hear a lot about that in the next year. We’ll make certain of it.)

The idea that milk was losing market share because consumers were turning to plant-based alternatives was always off-base. Now, it’s just a lie. And the decline of plant-based beverage isn’t likely to be an aberration: Once the initial hype is gone, and the sustainability claims are debunked, and the nutrition fallacies are exposed, what, exactly, does over-processed sugar water have going for it?

Oh, right, their misleading labels.

For now.

House Overwhelmingly Backs Whole Milk in Schools

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act on Dec. 13 with a commanding 330-99 margin, demonstrating compelling bipartisan support for expanding dairy in school meal nutrition programs.

The measure, led by Representatives GT Thompson, R-PA, and Kim Schrier, D-WA, expands the milk options schools can choose to include 2% and whole milk, in addition to the skim and 1% varieties currently allowed, increasing the number of tools schools can use to deliver vital nutrition to students by allowing more nutritious milk options schools can opt to serve.

“Expanding the milk schools can choose to serve to include 2% and whole is a common-sense solution that will help ensure kids have access to the same healthful milk options they drink at home,” said NMPF President and CEO Jim Mulhern upon House approval.

The House vote came after extensive Hill work and grassroots advocacy, including an NMPF call to action to its mailing list of dairy advocates that can be joined here. The legislation gained near-unanimous support among House Republicans and a majority of Democrats, generating significant momentum for Senate consideration this year.

NMPF has been committed to reinstating in schools the milk options removed in 2012, including 1% flavored milk and all varieties of 2% and whole. After years of working with members of Congress, meeting with USDA, and filing regulatory comments, 1% flavored milk was returned to school lunch menus on more permanent footing in 2022. NMPF has simultaneously built bipartisan support for 2% and whole milk options. NMPF also has been urging the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee to incorporate the robust body of scientific evidence showing the health benefits of dairy in all compositions, which should help expand dairy options in nutrition programs limited by dietary guidelines recommendations.

NMPF’s Galen Highlights Key 2023 Policy Achievements for Dairy Community As Christmas Approaches

Posted on by Chris Galen

 

NMPF’s Chris Galen offers a Christmas-themed list of for listeners of Dairy Radio Now on several major achievements for dairy farmers:  updating the milk pricing system, improving the Farm Bill, and expanding milk options in schools.  He describes how NMPF successfully created momentum in the House of Representatives for a bill that would expand students’ milk options in schools.

NMPF Applauds House Increasing Kids’ Access to Critical Nutrition

Posted on by Theresa Sweeney

The National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) emphatically commended the House of Representatives for taking a critical step toward improving child nutrition by approving the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act today with a commanding 330-99 bipartisan margin. The measure, led by Representatives GT Thompson, R-PA, and Kim Schrier, D-WA, expands the tools schools can use to deliver vital nutrition to students by increasing the variety of healthful milk options school can choose to serve.

“NMPF is delighted that the House approved the bipartisan Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act,” said Jim Mulhern, President & CEO of National Milk Producers Federation. “Milk’s unique nutritional profile gives it an unparalleled role in providing kids the nutrients they need. Expanding the milk schools can choose to serve to include 2% and whole is a common-sense solution that will help ensure kids have access to the same healthful milk options they drink at home. House passage is a critical step, and we urge the Senate to consider this bill immediately so it may be enacted into law.”

School milk, a mainstay of lunch menus for generations, plays an especially important role in improving nutrition security as an effective, inexpensive way of providing the nutrition kids need. NMPF has been tireless in its advocacy for reinstating whole milk, which was removed from school lunch menus in 2012. Since then, advancing science on the benefits of milk at all fat levels, as well as evidence of increased food waste from current limited choices, makes its return a top nutrition priority for schoolchildren, the families who serve nutritious fuller-fat varieties at home, and the school meal professionals who strive to effectively nourish those whom they serve.

The House-approved Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act will now be sent to the Senate, which already has its own version of the bill. The Senate measure is being led by Senators Roger Marshall, R-KS, and Peter Welch, D-VT, and has Republican, Democratic, and Independent cosponsors.