Why don't they use Milk?

[Cocobeau]

I'm always curious when I visit other countries why they don't seem to have the obsession with milk that we have in the UK? In some countries I've visited it's been nearly impossible to find any fresh milk even in large supermarkets, just UHT. Other places you can find fresh milk, but very limited in small sections. I've certainly never seen anything like the entire fridges dedicated to the various milk types we have in the UK (maybe except for NZ). So why do we feel such a strong need for fresh milk and not the rest of the world? What do they use instead? Do they just give their kids water once they've come off breast/infant milk?

You've obviously not visited The Netherlands!

What counties are you referring to? Some countries don’t actually have dairy farms - so they rely mostly on UHT, I imagine fresh is considerably more expensive or just not as readily available then so that makes sense. It’s not a ‘need’ for milk as much as it’s readily available so we make good use of it. Other countries use other things that are easily available and cultivated in their’s but we in turn would pay a fortune for them or not have the same level of stock of it.

More common in northern european countries. Montignac is suite interesting about it, reckoning it Plays some part in obesity.

Also, Germany has lots of milk. And the cheese aisles are on a whole other level compared to the UK.

Do you mean fresh milk? UHT milk is milk, too....

In a lot of hotter countries, even Spain, I think it's just too hard to keep fresh in the heat. Maybe the retailers don't have the capacity for all fresh food that needs robust refrigeration and needs to not be left out anywhere at all or else it will spoil.

Then as a consumer you have to buy your milk and get it into your own fridge quickly and maybe it's too inconvenient?

The heat will mean that doorstep delivery never took off so people didn't take daily fresh milk for granted like we do in the UK.

Some countries buy their milk everyday from a small shop and not a supermarket.

They don't buy big bottles just what they need for the day and then go and buy it again the next day.

Plenty of milk and milk products here in Sweden.

In the UK, cereal is the main breakfast choice for most children and that is often prepared with milk.

In other countries cereal is not seen as a meal so they will not need as much milk. Just the milk they use for drinking.

Milk keeps better in the dark - the see through bottles in the UK make little sense, I think many other counties use cartons, UHT or not. Although I guess not as easily recycled.

Just think about what milk is to mammals like us and do we actually need it.We like it but we definitely can go on without it as many countries show.The same way seme countries don't have beef or pork ,alcohol etc

Climate, geography, and the reality of farming.

There are few economies in the world where entire populations live within a day or two's drive of dairy farming regions, and the refrigeration requirements wouldn't be extremely onerous, both of which are needed to distribute fresh milk cost effectively.

Then consider that in most parts of the world, milk production is not constant; it ebbs and flows depending on seasons, weather, the cows' diets and so on. However, demand is fairly constant, so a way needs to be found to preserve the surplus production in peak times for when supply cannot meet demand in production troughs.

The modern answer to all of this which preserves most of the characteristics of milk is UHT, which is why most of the rest of the world has adopted it.

Be grateful you don't live in a place where powdered milk (like the American "Klim" of my childhood) is still the norm.

Well the primary function of cows milk is to fatten their offspring.
My mum told me that , as a child in the 1930s, in a city, milk was a rarity , and it was only after WWII that , in her case, it became a staple.
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I have lived in several countries around the world, and breakfast more often than not, consisted of cheese or yoghurts, made from cows, ewes , or goats milk; milks that were fermented, or preserved or changed to have a longer like ; other than North America, where cereal & milk, cookies & milk etc are common.
So I think it’s just that other countries have a different dietary focus.

For lots of cultures dairy is not a main staple of their diet like it is in the UK, Europe etc. I've lived in a few SE Asian countries and many people there are lactose intolerant so there's not much market for fresh milk

For good, marketable milk production you need good lush grass, and reliable rainfall, and the right soils. Hence why it is such a thing in regions like northern Europe, NZ. So people living in other places would not have access to (much) milk and so would not have such a dairy tradition.

@JillFromHolt

For lots of cultures dairy is not a main staple of their diet like it is in the UK, Europe etc. I've lived in a few SE Asian countries and many people there are lactose intolerant so there's not much market for fresh milk

Yep, put simply N Europeans evolved a need to digest dairy, other peoples did not.

lack of dairy farming due to the wrong conditions for optimum dairy farming. You need a certain temperature and rainfall for the grass to grow enough to keep the cows fed (GCSE geography case study!)

There are differences in the level of lactose intolerance in some areas. People of Asian descent are much more likely to struggle to digest cows milk.

So, historically they would have based their diets around other things, farming structures etc followed.

^ that should say caucasians!

I went on holiday to the Canary Islands as a teenager and visited a small supermarket to shop for our week there. Lots of UHT milk available which I had no experience of and assumed would be horrible so bought the 1 type of fresh milk available. After the walk home it would have been out the fridge 30 minutes in 35 degree heat. Next morning opened it to find sour milk! Of course it might have been off already but presumably the heat is one major reason why fresh is not more prevalent, at all points in the supply chain.

You've obviously not visited The Netherlands!

@TeenPlusCat you beat me too it.

Some countries don't have milk because the people are intolerant to the lactose e.g. East Asians. Historically some ethnicities have been consuming milk for a very long time while others didn't; and those who didn't become intolerant once they are weaned from their own mother's breast milk and lose the lactase enzyme which digests milk

Because many people in other countries are lactose intolerant.

Besides the fact that cows' milk has been linked to breast and prostrate cancer.

And, in case you didnt realise it, you're not a baby cow.

Humans are the only species that drink milk beyond weaning and the milk of another species to boot.
Humans be like:
Pig milk? yeuch!
Horse milk? yeuch!
Rhinoceros milk? yeuch!
Cow milk? Yum, bring it on!

Milk tastes disgusting and is conceptually weird

It is weird to consume cows milk if you think about it. I do still have it sometimes in tea and still have yoghurt and cheese etc but I am going off of it. Then I start to think about how a lot of cows are treated, not all. Maybe I should give it up 🤔 .