The rBST controversy
BST (bovine somatropin) is a hormone that performs a number of duties, one of these being telling the cow’s body it needs to produce milk. This energy allows feed to be directed towards milk production instead of weight gain, without compromising the cow’s health.
The more BST hormone, generally, the more milk the cow will produce. So when farmers have been choosing bull with the genetics that lead to daughters with greater milk production, some of that genetics causes higher levels of BST. You might say that some of the selective breeding occurring in the last half century has been done with the indirect purpose of increasing BST levels in the milking herd.(G1)
So little would change if we started injecting cows directly with a synthetic BST hormone. Before 1994 this wasn’t commercially possible because creating a synthetic version of the hormone was too expensive. This changed with a biotechnology firm was able to genetically modify a bacteria that would produce the hormone, and the synthetic hormone (referred to as recombinant BST, or rBST) was approved by regulators in the U.S., Mexico, Europe, and elsewhere.
The rBST has to be given by an injection. Because the hormone is a protein it would be broken down in the digestive system of the cow if added to their feed.
Farmers who used it found that milk production increased by 5 to 15%,(D1) which would be like identifying a particular bull whose progeny would yield 10 to 15% more milk than the offspring of other bulls. It lowers the price of milk, and assuming the production of rBST doesn’t create a lot of carbon emissions, lowers the carbon footprint of milk also.
Only about 20-30% of U.S. dairy cows receive rBST. This would be like a majority of producers choosing not to breed their cows to superior bulls, but there is a good reason. Ever since its introduction rBST has been controversial. On the one hand, it is approved by most all scientific and health organizations, as well as the Food and Drug Administration. On the other hand, a vocal group of activists are skeptical, and believe that the Monsanto corporation (who held the patent on rBST) was able to use its political influence to “write their own regulations׆, in a sense.
If you go into almost any store in Oklahoma to buy milk in Oklahoma you will see two things on the label. First, it will tell you that farmers have “pledged” not to use rBST (an artificial growth hormone), as if doing so would be dishonorable. Then it tells you that there is no difference between milk from cows that did and did not receive it. What’s going on?
FIGURE —EXAMPLE OF MILK LABEL
The farmers’ pledge is in response to consumer concerns. Give consumers a choice between milk that does and does not have this pledge, and consumers take the one with the pledge, and will even pay a premium to do so. At the same time, the pledge alone is like false advertising, since it suggests that milk without rBST is safer, so the seller includes the second part about the FDA to prevent being sued for false advertisements.
It seems as if scientists and consumers believe entirely different things. Indeed, that is exactly what is going on.
How does an economist think about the label saying the farmers didn’t use rBST?
On the one hand, if many consumers are truly concerned about the use of rBST, then perhaps they have the right to know whether it was used to produce their milk. Consumers have that right regardless of whether scientists and regulators agree with them.
On the other hand, saying the milk was produced without the use of rBST suggests there is something dangerous about milk from farms that did use rBST. For instance, what if a company put on its label that it was produced by farmers who pledged not to feed their cows alfalfa hay, when we know there is absolutely nothing with feeding alfalfa hay? The average person would naturally infer that there is something dangerous about Alfalfa hay. It deceives consumers. I was thinking about this issue one day when I watched the following scene from Arrested Development that relays this idea perfectly.
Video —Analogy from Arrested Development
What consumers want, I think, is both. They want the right to know about activities or ingredients that concern them, but only those things which there is valid evidence for concern. Most people have considerable respect for the scientific organizations and governmental agencies like the FDA that have deemed rBST safe. At the same time, they know scientists and the FDA have been wrong, like when they approved of feeding cattle the rendered carcasses of sheep, only to find that it probably caused Mad Cow disease. When consumers heard about this they might have started asking questions, and then found out that people were feeding cattle other disturbing feeds like processed chicken manure.
In ensuring a safe food supply we tend to rely on two things: scientific evidence and intuition. This intuition is formed from tradition and from beliefs about the way the natural world works. Science lets use go beyond intuition and accomplish remarkable things impossible with traditional agriculture, like complete animal feeds and artificial insemination. Intuition cautions us against going too fast, and that when you use new technologies it is impossible to predict all the consequences.
The two conflicting labels that I showed you tries to accomplish both. It says there’s no reason to be concerned about rBST, but if for some reason you are, this milk was produced by farmers who didn’t use it.
Let me conclude by summarizing the various views on rBST.
- The FDA (and virtually all prestigious scientific organizations) have concluded that the rBST hormone, meaning BST produced by genetically engineered bacteria, is indistinguishable from BST, are present in similar amounts in milk, are inactive in the human body, and another other differences in the milk have no impact on human health.
- It is true that cows receiving rBST are more likely to develop mastitis, but that is also true of cows that produce more milk naturally. Moreover, if antibiotics are given to the cow to treat the mastitis the milk it produces cannot be used for human consumption (remember the FDA has a zero tolerance for antibiotic residues on milk). Groups opposed to rBST have claimed that the corporation developing rBST hid the association between rBST and mastitis. That may or may not be true, but it is an association scientists probably expected anyway, and so long as regulations are enforced, that relationship may be bad for the cows but not for human health.
- There has been some controversy around something called IGF-1, which stands for “insulin-like growth factor 1, which are in higher amounts of milk from cows treated with rBST. People with high levels of IGF-1 in their blood may have a greater chance of developing cancer, but the literature is far from certain. Moreover, while adults who drink milk are more likely to have higher IGF-1 levels, the same is true for people who drink soymilk. So this has become one of those things that, if you are naturally fearful of rBST, it can add to your anxieties, but if you trust the regulatory system this hasn’t given you any reason to doubt that trust.
- When Ohio tried to enact a ban on labeling milk “rBST free” the court ruled that milk from cows treated with rBST is compositionally different, due to the higher levels of IGF. So this is an issue still being fought in the public and the legal hemisphere.(N1)
References
(N1) Norwood, F. Bailey, Michelle Calvo, Sarah Lancaster, and Oltenacu Pascal. 2014. Agricultural and Food Controversies: What Everyone Needs to Know. Oxford Publishing: NY, NY.
