Cheese in the Time of Industrial Farming and Climate Change
By Katherine Kornei, Eos/AGU.
Excerpt: Cows, with their four stomach pouches, are evolutionarily primed to consume grass and extract all the nutrients possible from that roughage. ...But bovines around the world are increasingly being fed a corn-based diet as industrial-scale farming proliferates—it’s often easier, more efficient, and more scalable to feed cows from a trough rather than allow them to forage in a pasture. ...But bovines around the world are increasingly being fed a corn-based diet as industrial-scale farming proliferates—it’s often easier, more efficient, and more scalable to feed cows from a trough rather than allow them to forage in a pasture. ...Climate change is also driving that shift. Even in regions that have long turned cows out to green pastures, farmers are facing summertime grass shortages due to droughts. ...Delbès and her collaborators found that the shift from a diet of 25% grazed grass to one of 0% grazed grass was more detrimental to a cheese’s nutritional and sensory qualities than the shift from a 75% grazed grass diet to a 50% grazed grass diet. The finding suggests that maintaining at least a modicum of fresh grass is critical to ensuring quality cheese, Delbès said....