Dairies and ranchers want to push plant-based alternatives off their turf.
Almond, oat, coconut and other milk alternatives have contributed to the steady erosion in sales of cow’s milk over the years. Now, newer meat alternatives made by Impossible Foods Inc. and Beyond Meat Inc. are raising similar concerns for ranchers.
Trade groups representing meat and milk producers said today that they are ramping up marketing to underscore the difference between their cattle-made products and new rivals made from soy, almonds and peas.
“We want to be out there telling the truth,” Jennifer Houston, president of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, said at The Wall Street Journal’s ongoing Global Food Forum in New York.
That association and other groups also want legal limits on the ability of plant-based producers to call their products milk or meat. This year, 45 bills have been introduced in 27 states that seek to police the labeling of plant-based products and cell-cultured meats, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. One in Louisiana passed earlier this year.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration held a hearing last month on how to update dozens of labeling standards governing food products, including plant-based meats.
Plant-based food producers and promoters argue that those proposed laws violate their right to free speech. They say consumers gravitate toward soy milk and pea-derived burgers because of their nonanimal ingredients, not because they are confused about the products’ content. Read the full story.
