Canada’s Milk Contradiction

Dairy cows graze in a field in Saint-Pie, Que., on July 11, 2025. The Canadian Press/Christinne Muschi

Commentary

I am old enough to remember when milk was considered one of the healthy building blocks of any human diet. I remember glass bottles delivered to the door with the cream sitting on top waiting for whoever reached it first to sneak a taste before the rest of the family arrived. I remember the reminders from Mom and Granny: “Drink your milk. It will build strong bones.”

I also remember when the cream disappeared.

Milk began to look less like milk and more like pale dirty dishwater. In my 20s, I began struggling with digestive issues and was told I had “lactose intolerance” and was struggling with a digestive disorder that was “exacerbated” by milk and milk products. These were ailments that had previously been foreign to me.

What had seemed unusual gradually emerged as a growing problem among a whole generation of young people. Increasingly, digestive disorders, sensitivities, allergies, and intolerance of milk products seemed less like anomalies and more like part of a broader shift.

Years later, my oldest child, not yet 2 years old, had a severe anaphylactic reaction after drinking a glass of milk. We were told she had a severe milk protein allergy and was to avoid all milk and milk products.

Then, sometime around 2005, I was introduced to raw milk.

I remember cautiously watching my daughter drink it for the first time, waiting for the reaction that never came. No inflammation. No stomach pain. Only surprise.

“Mom,” she said, “this doesn’t even taste like milk.”

I laughed and answered: “Actually, it tastes exactly like milk.”

Only later did I discover that what we were drinking was considered illegal contraband in Canada.

These personal experiences are my own and do not reflect the views or conclusions of the National Citizens Inquiry. They are, however, part of the reason I listened carefully during the recent NCI hearings in Kelowna as politician Maxime Bernier and food policy expert Dr. Sylvain Charlebois testified about Canada’s dairy regulatory system.

What struck me most was not that the two men agreed on everything. They clearly did not.

Bernier called Canada’s supply management regime a “legal cartel” and argued that Canadians are paying artificially inflated prices because production, quotas, and tariffs are tightly controlled. Charlebois, by contrast, defended the need for stability in agriculture and warned against dismantling the system overnight. Yet even he acknowledged that “supply management is not perfect policy” and described serious structural failures within the current regime.

Both men testified to something Canadians rarely hear discussed openly: the extraordinary political sensitivity surrounding dairy regulation in this country.

Bernier argued that politicians are afraid to challenge what he repeatedly called the “milk cartel,” describing a system so politically influential that even debating reform becomes difficult. Charlebois similarly testified that many of the problems within the system are simply ignored because acknowledging them would expose weaknesses in the regime itself.

Perhaps nowhere is that contradiction more visible than in the issue of milk disposal.

Canadians facing food inflation and rising grocery costs may be surprised to learn that significant quantities of milk are routinely discarded under the current system. Bernier described milk dumping as a regular occurrence tied directly to quota enforcement. Charlebois went further, estimating that hundreds of millions of litres of milk may be discarded annually through both on-farm dumping and what the industry calls “skimming.”

Even more troubling was his testimony that no national body appears to consistently track the full scope of the waste. “They do not track that,” he testified regarding disposal figures.

At the same time, Canada remains one of the few Western countries where the sale of raw milk is broadly criminalized.

This raises difficult questions that extend beyond dairy itself.

Why is a natural food that sustained generations treated as dangerous contraband, while increasingly engineered food substitutes are presented as progressive innovation?

Recent government actions suggest that these questions are becoming increasingly relevant. Health Canada has established regulatory pathways for cellular agriculture and precision-fermented food products, including animal-free dairy proteins. At the same time, researchers and commentators have begun examining what these developments may mean for consumers, farmers, and the future of food production.

Independent researcher David Speicher has drawn attention to these developments in his public writing, while molecular biologist Dr. John Fagan and his colleagues have published research examining the molecular composition of precision-fermented dairy proteins and identifying areas where additional investigation may be warranted.

Whether one supports or opposes these technologies is not the central issue.

The issue is consistency.

Canada increasingly speaks the language of “choice” in almost every area of public life. Recreational cannabis has been legalized nationwide, and British Columbia recently experimented with drug decriminalization policies unprecedented in Canadian history.Yet a farmer selling raw milk directly to a willing customer can still face aggressive enforcement actions under laws many Canadians scarcely understand.

That contradiction deserves public examination.

None of this means food safety should be ignored. It should not. Even Charlebois emphasized the importance of strong food standards and acknowledged legitimate concerns surrounding agricultural regulation. But regulation and prohibition are not the same thing, and while many Canadians continue to place enormous trust in regulatory institutions, others are beginning to ask whether the present system serves consumers, protects entrenched interests, or simply limits meaningful debate altogether.

These questions are unlikely to disappear. They touch on issues of food safety, consumer choice, agricultural policy, technological innovation, and the role of regulatory institutions in shaping what Canadians eat.

They are also questions that continue to emerge through public testimony. Earlier this year, the National Citizens Inquiry heard from witnesses as diverse as Maxime Bernier and Sylvain Charlebois, who approached Canada’s dairy system from very different perspectives yet identified concerns worthy of public discussion.

That conversation is expected to continue when the National Citizens Inquiry resumes hearings later this summer in Alberta. Scheduled witnesses are expected to include Sally Fallon Morell of the Weston A. Price Foundation, Canadian dairy farmer Michael Schmidt, independent researcher David Speicher, and molecular biologist Dr. John Fagan.

The National Citizens Inquiry provides a platform where witnesses can place evidence, research, and lived experience on the public record for consideration.

Surely a country confident in its institutions should be able to openly discuss all three.

Dominique Fournier holds a Master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Calgary. She writes on culture, food, public policy, and family wellness, with a particular interest in how cultural assumptions and public policy shape everyday health and community life. She also publishes reflections and commentary on Substack.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.