This Week On Unearthed - You'd Better Believe It's Not Butter

27th May 2023

Greenpeace exposes many threats to our environment. In this weekends newsletter from Unearthed they highlight how big business via the Dairy Industry is attempting to squeeze anything that is an alternative to milk based products using plants.

Unearthed's Zach Boren had a great investigation out this week, revealing that UK manufacturers of plant-based alternatives to dairy are facing a crackdown on the use of names like "mylk", "sheese", and "b+tter".

According to new draft trading standards guidelines seen by Unearthed, brands could also be banned from using terms like "plant-based yoghurt", "vegan cheese", "cheddar-type" and "mozzarella alternative".

It could even see makers of oat milk barred from describing their product as "not milk".

The trade body Plant Based Food Alliance UK told Unearthed that these rules would "make us one of the most draconian nations in regards to what we can and cannot call these sorts of products".

The guidance is being prepared by the Food Standards Information Group (FSIG), a group of senior trading standards experts, and is intended to guide local officials on how to enforce the law governing vegan alternatives.

Unearthed's investigation details how the dairy industry has been lobbying the UK government for years for tougher enforcement of these regulations.

Trade group Dairy UK said the draft opinion issued by the FSIG was "intended to make labelling and marketing clearer and minimise opportunities for consumers to be misled."

But the idea that consumers needed protection from thinking that almond milk might be the same as the cow stuff got rinsed on twitter, with the FT's John Burn-Murdoch suggesting that the dairy industry wanted plant-based alternatives to be "sold in plain brown packaging and hidden on the top shelf".

Read the full story - UK to crack down on plant-based food and drink labels

Unearth is an arm of Greenpeace.
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PHOTO
Drinks like Oatly cannot call themselves 'milk.' Photo: Oatly