CHARLEBOIS: Canada can fix its milk dumping problem, easily

A video of an exasperated Canadian dairy farmer, Jerry Huigen, went viral last week. For probably the first time in Canadian history, a Canadian dairy farmer was filmed while discarding milk on his own farm. That video has now been viewed by almost 3 million people. It shocked many Canadians, who were wondering why this is even possible when food prices are skyrocketing at the grocery store.

The dairy industry has its reasons. Supply management, which is our government-sanctioned quota system, allows 9,500 dairy farmers to produce what we need as a country. The system is highly protected with import tariffs, and the Canadian Dairy Commission sets an appropriate price for farm milk, so farmers can make a decent living.

But dairy cows cannot magically start and stop making milk and butter fat. It just doesn’t work that way. So, most farmers will overshoot to hit their quota. Feed, the weather, and many other factors influence milk production — most Canadians can appreciate that.

Based on rough estimates, it is believed Canadian dairy farmers can dump up to 300 million litres a year in Canada. We asked the Canadian Dairy Commission for exact figures on the amount of milk dumped, and they could not say, which is a problem in and of itself. Since the dairy industry is self-regulated but highly protected by public policy, the Commission, a crown corporation, ought to know. But transparency is hardly the dairy sector’s strong point.