Vegans to drink cows milk?

[Sunrise234]

A new study from the Sustainable Food Trust and the University of Nottingham is encouraging vegans to stop drinking Soya milk and drink cows milk instead as it is less harmful to the rainforest/planet.

What are people's views on this?

I am not vegan but I drink almond milk due to a slight intolerance to cows milk but I am conscious of animal cruelty and saving the planet so I want to make good choices.

Does anyone know if almond milk is better than cow/soya milk?

Does anyone know if almond milk is better than cow/soya milk?

It's a tricky one. It takes shit loads of water to grow almonds and make almond milk, plus they are not grown in this country.

I have no idea to be honest.

Oat milk has the lowest carbon footprint out of dairy and the mainstream alternatives. I only drink soy milk when out and about when they don't have oat. I haven't seen the study but I'd have thought the massive amount of soya grown to feed cattle would be more of an issue than soy milk!

You won’t get militant vegans drinking cows milk.

They say the cow is raped in order to get the calf and therefore the milk.

But I have heard almond and soya milk are bad for the environment so I don’t know

You won’t get militant vegans drinking cows milk

Or any Vegans.

Sustainable Food Trust appears to have a number of farmers on its board of directors. No reason they’d want to maintain the status quo.

www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/28/what-plant-milk-should-i-drink-almond-killing-bees-aoe

This article goes through several non-dairy milks. Seems from this that oat is the best.

Hangingover dairy cattle in this country are rarely fed soy derivatives unless they are waste product from producing human grade food. Oat milk would be the least environmentally damaging of the non dairy milks

I understand Oat milk is better than both soy and almond.
We use both almond (on breakfast cereal and for pancakes) and oat (in coffee and smoothies) and dairy milk (in tea!) at home.
Our cows milk is generally british organic so the cows should not be fed soy.....
I will double check that though because as a family we avoid soy due to its impact on the environment, the food miles it travels to get to british consumers and its potential impact on the endocrine system (due to personal health history rather than a general issue).

I cannot see any vegans choosing cows milk. They wouldn't be vegan if they did!
Vegetarians can use cows milk and many do.

Oat milk is by far the nicest plant 'milk' anyway.

Oat milk is nice, except don't try it with porridge! It becomes very stodgy and too oaty (water is fine with porridge if you don't drink cows milk)

I thought (British) vegans cared about animal rights/welfare above all else. So environment comes 2nd or 3rd ... whatever

veganism can be defined differently elsewhere but the British Vegan society insists on their definition which is about animal rights above all other possible priorities; you can't be vegan in Britain if you aren't behaving like that for animal welfare reasons.

@lljkk

I thought (British) vegans cared about animal rights/welfare above all else. So environment comes 2nd or 3rd ... whatever

veganism can be defined differently elsewhere but the British Vegan society insists on their definition which is about animal rights above all other possible priorities; you can't be vegan in Britain if you aren't behaving like that for animal welfare reasons.

But still, some people in Britain are vegan for environmental reasons. DH has a friend like that, he also doesn't eat some other foods because, even though they're vegan, they're not good for the environment. He says he'd happily have 99% of cows put down immediately because of the environmental impact of farming so many. If it turned out that dairy really wasn't as bad for the environment as previously thought (I appreciate this isn't what's being said now), and was better than alternatives, he'd switch back no problem.

Thanks I will definitely look into oat milk I've not heard of that before but it seems a better option than soya, almond and cows milk so far.

This is the link from the sustainable food trust and I think it has the link to the study on it too if anyone is interested.

sustainablefoodtrust.org/articles/local-alternatives-to-soya-and-palm-meal-will-help-save-rainforests/

Humans are the only species that drinks milk beyond infancy, you know that, right ?

I'm not a vegetarian or vegan and haven't drunk milk (or any of its fake alternatives) for years. We can manage without - problem solved!

I know Americans who eat like Vegans for environmental, political or health reasons. But if you follow the British debate (& British Vegan Society which appoints self as ultimate authority), they are NOT vegan. That's ok. Those people just aren't British vegans.

So depends one defines vegan and there's more than one definition kicking around. So whether people would change from soy to cow milk depends which brand of the philosophy they find themselves in, but then they have to brave the criticism (from some) that they aren't true enough believers and are outrageous to use the vegan title at all.

I reckon Nottingham Uni should finely adjust their msg to "Drinking cow's milk is better than soy milk for the environment" and leave out the "vegan" word completely, although "this message may be of interest to people on plant-based diets". "Vegan" is just too contentious & ill-defined a group to address or target.

Humans are the only species that drinks milk beyond infancy, you know that, right ?

Humans are the only species that do a hell of a lot of things!

My while family is vegan and we would never drink cows milk. We drink oat milk and usually make our own. The dairy industry is disgusting. Vegan to us is someone who is in it for the animal's. Anyone else is plant based.

Soy milk is not the only alternative though? Plus no vegan is going to drink cows milk. if they do they are not vegan

Oat milk is where it's at. One litre of almond milk takes like 6000 litres of water to produce and they're mostly from California which has had a drought for pretty much two decades now I think.

Saying that, I thought it's all supposed to be better than cow's milk from an environmental impact point of view.

Ah my mother has started writing for the sustainable food trust it seems.
If the only milk was cow milk (beef milk when I’m feeling argumentative) or no milk I would choose no milk. It’s not essential. It’s not that cows are raped (this is a human value and moral judgement) it’s that they are kept being milked for years, kept pregnant, bred to produce stupendous quantities of milk now of which is good for the individual cow or the planet. I’ll stop before I start on about “calf at foot dairies”
Oat milk all the way though, and oat ice cream for that matter.

I reckon Nottingham Uni should finely adjust their msg to "Drinking cow's milk is better than soy milk for the environment" and leave out the "vegan" word completely, although "this message may be of interest to people on plant-based diets". "Vegan" is just too contentious & ill-defined a group to address or target.

I do agree with this.
The actual news headline was something like "vegans urged to drink cows milk" which is great for getting people to read the article but actually the study is aimed at those who drink soya milk whether they are vegan or not.

I thought (British) vegans cared about animal rights/welfare above all else. So environment comes 2nd or 3rd ... whatever

Isn't animal welfare part of the environment too ?

Hemp milk is nice.

no vegan is going to drink cows milk. if they do they are not vegan

Veganism is a social construct. If someone drinks cows milk and identifies as vegan then that's up to them.