Fit To Eat S3E20 Lucas Strong by Ivan Emke

There are a few food items that get a lot of press. I’m not talking about parsnip or horseradish here. But milk. Dairy in general. In fact, up until 2019, the Canada Food Guide included dairy as its very own food group. That had been the case since the food guide first came out in 1942. Despite that change, dairy continues to be a major contributor to the Canadian diet – although as our guest today notes, these days many people are more likely to eat dairy than to drink it.

The other thing that puts dairy in the news is that it is a Supply Managed Commodity – a system that was put in place in 1972, as a response to numerous crises in Canadian agriculture in the 1960s. Now, as a citizen of this country, you are likely well aware of the many intricacies of supply management, right? I mean, the interweb is full of tweeting prophets expounding on the virtues (though more often the evils) of such a system. But very few of those folks spend any time in the milking parlour. So today I’m heading to the barn to talk to a dairy farmer about the everyday challenges of producing one of this country’s most widely recognized food products.

Today on "Fit to Eat" we head to Hillside Holsteins in Harcourt, just across the Smith Sound from Random Island, not far from Clarenville, to meet up with Lucas Strong. In addition to the usual challenges of farming, he also chats about things like quotas (in order to manage supply, dairy farmers require quota – not unlike lots of folks in the fishery) or the differences between fluid milk (which is destined for drinking) and industrial milk (which is used for other dairy products). It is a crisp December morning, but the barn is comfortable, with the sweet smells of sileage and the sound of assorted equipment – oh, and the chewing of cuds. Join us in the parlour - not the one in the house with the piano, but the one in the barn with the milking robots!

Season 3 of Fit to Eat is supported by the Community Radio Fund of Canada.