We must support dairy farming or run the risk of destroying it

Tuesday 2nd March 2010, 2:59PM GMT.

From Angela Mitchell.
LIFE is a risk. No matter what you do, there is a risk. From the minute you walk out of your front door in the morning, nothing is risk-free.

Gambling on the stock market, investing in funds, even importing semen, there is always an element of risk. When it goes wrong it always hurts, but it is our choice to take that risk and nobody else can be blamed. You have to take the knock on the chin and get on with your life.

I chose not to use imported semen, as I didn’t want to take the risk – that was my choice. Nobody was forced to use this imported semen.

Jersey Dairy produces some of the best dairy products in the world and our Islanders are very lucky to have such a service. The dairy farmers safeguard our countryside, keeping it green with a visual and environmental impact that the public can enjoy.

Without the dairy farmers, this countryside would be wrapped in plastic, once the potato season started, from north to south and from east to west.

Dairy farmers do their best to prevent creeping urbanisation into the countryside to safeguard available agricultural land to grow food for an increasing population. This is not just an Island problem. This is a global problem as urbanisation is decreasing agricultural land at such a rate that we will not be able to feed the growing population on a global basis.

Jersey Dairy care very much about feeding Islanders, and it is only on very rare occasions that they let the public down. The staff at Jersey Dairy work extremely hard to guarantee that the public have access to a wide range of their superb products. The board members are several farmers who give up a great deal of their valuable time making sure the industry runs as smoothly as possible.

The RJAHS have a dedicated team that do everything in their power to safeguard our Jersey cow. They have council members who are totally honorary and give up a huge amount of their time to keep the Jersey cow as an animal to be recognised globally.

These are just a few reasons why we must go forward, and not be destructive but productive. As I say, life is a risk, no matter what you do, and the biggest returns usually have the highest risks. Maybe I am just not a gambler.

1
Wilson Riou

March 3, 2010 at 12:07 am

Ms Mitchell’s spirited defense of the dairy industry sounds like a TV commercial for milk from the sixties! Nowadays you would have to be from another planet not to be aware that consuming milk products is NOT good for your health and that cattle farming is an appallingly uneconomical use of land resources as well as a major contributor to anthropogenic CO2 and methane emissions. Not to mention the environmental impact of pesticides / fertilizers, antibiotics and the ethics of permanently pregnant cows and cyclical calf slaughter.

It is known that milk consumption is linked to colon cancers, heart disease, diabetes and respiratory disfunction in the developed world as these are largely absent in African and Asian communities that don’t drink milk.

Cattle farming is responsible for 18% of CO2 and 37% of methane emissions and 70% of the deforestation in Latin America.

However the Jersey cow is pretty, I grant you that but maybe not forever. The European royal families didn’t become ugly, sickly half-wits because they ate too much caviar – it was the limited gene pool that was responsible!

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2
Sarf London Lad

March 3, 2010 at 6:29 pm

Has no one at Jersey Dairy ever thought of marketing skimmed milk? The resulting cream could be used to develop a Jersey cheese industry.

Skimmed milk may be heresy for Jersey Dairy, but it also means lower cholesterol levels and a subsequent reduced incidence of coronary disease.

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3
Pip Clement

March 3, 2010 at 8:17 pm

Cream is used for making butter, it is not used for making cheese!
Both Jersey Dairy and the Classic Herd make cheese.
Most of the milk sold in the island is reduced fat ie some or almost all of the cream is removed.
I occasionally buy a carton of the full cream stuff for my coffee and the cat, thankfully he is not worried about cholesterol or coronary heart disease

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