'Powder to the People: Slaking China's Thirst for Milk'

choi

David Pierson, China's thirst for milk gives US dairy farms a boost. American dairy farmers see an opportunity as demand booms in China. In a Nevada town, a new factory will produce milk powder just for export. Los Angeles Times, Mar 15, 2014 (photo gallery)
www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-feeding-china-dairy-20140315,0,5345274.story
(The first New Zealand-designed, $85-million, whole-milk powder facility in US, in Fallon, Navada, to open next month, dedicated solely to export of milk powder in bags, and to China ONLY. Workers broke ground on the factory in August 2012)

Quote:

China's "growing thirst for milk is shaking up almost every corner of the global dairy industry. * * * China is the world's top dairy importer. Revenue in the country's dairy market reached $40 billion last year, a fivefold increase from a decade ago, according to market research firm Euromonitor. * * * Parents in China depend heavily on powdered milk to deliver protein and calcium to infants and young children. Breast feeding is unpopular, and fledgling distribution networks mean the availability of cold, fresh milk is limited.

'Germany, New Zealand and France have ramped up [milk] production. Now the United States is getting into the act. With U.S. dairy consumption flat, American dairy exports are growing at a record clip. Shipments to China alone grew to $706 million last year, up from $137 million in 2009, according to the US Dairy Export Council in Virginia. Overseas demand is driving up milk prices in US supermarkets.
"Chinese dairy brands are buying tens of thousands of cows from New Zealand, Australia and Uruguay. China imported 300,000 metric tons of alfalfa hay from the US last year, largely to feed the dairy herds.

"Longtime Fallon dairyman Pete Olsen said it was quickly apparent how important food safety was to the Yili executives. 'The first words out of their mouths were, "How often do you test for heavy metals in your milk?"' said Olsen, whose family has been milking cows in Nevada for nearly 100 years. 'I was blown away. I had to explain that doesn't happen here. They have problems we don't even have to think about.'

"The [Fallon] factory is designed to process 40 tanker truckloads of milk a day. The fluid will end up pumped through high-pressure nozzles into a heating chamber that looks like an inverted Apollo spacecraft. So fine is the spray from the needle-sized nozzles, partially evaporated milk is instantly converted to powder as it's jettisoned into the 400-degree crucible.

Note:
(a)
(i) The title of my posting is directly from that of the photo gallery of LA Times, which started appearing online, all by itself without the article (I scratched my head, searched the Web and found nothing on this topic in news reports or recent press release).  (Today when the photo album is an accompaniment to the report, the title of the photo gallery does not show up--still the stand-alone photo gallery retains the title in the Latimes.com.)
(ii) Of course, Powder to the People is a word play on
power to the people (slogan).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_to_the_people_%28slogan%29
(During the 1960s in the United States, young people began speaking and writing this phrase as a form of rebellion against what they perceived as the oppression by the older generation, especially The Establishment)

(b) Dairy Farmers of America
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dairy_Farmers_of_America
(in 48 [contiguous] states; formed in 1998 through the merger of four dairy cooperatives)
(c) Be Part of Nevada’s Growing Dairy Industry. DFA, undated.
www.dfainfo.com/dfamilk/fallon/N ... try_memberfinal.pdf

(d) Fallon, Nevada
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallon,_Nevada
(county seat of Churchill County; located in the Lahontan Valley; mostly agricultural areas: "Although the area is arid, approximately 50,000 acres (200 km2) of its pastureland are irrigated with water from the Truckee–Carson Irrigation District. The principal crop grown is alfalfa for livestock feed")
(i) The city is "named after Michael Fallon, an early settler."
(ii) The Irish surname Fallon is "reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Ó Fallamhain ‘descendant of Fallamhan,’ a byname meaning ‘leader’ (from follamhnas ‘supremacy’)."

(e) "'Getting your milk from America is like the Good Housekeeping seal of approval to them [Chinese],' [Fallon Mayor Ken] Tedford said. 'We take that for granted.'"
(i) Good Housekeeping
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Housekeeping
(a magazine founded 1885 by Clark W Bryan in Holyoke, Massachusetts and bought by Hearst Corp; well known for the "Good Housekeeping Seal," popularly known as the "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval")
(ii) What does the seal look like?
About the Good Housekeeping Seal; How our magazine and the GH Seal protect you. Good Housekeeping, undated.
www.goodhousekeeping.com/product ... d-housekeeping-seal

(f) dairyman (n): "one who operates a dairy farm or works in a dairy"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dairyman