Consumers “understand that plant-based milk alternatives do not contain milk,” the draft said, citing a study in which about three-quarters of respondents said they knew such products were not made with dairy. The FDA also said focus group research had indicated that referring to such products as “milk” is “strongly rooted in consumers’ vocabulary.”
The FDA is also recommending that alternative milk makers include labeling that explicitly notes key nutritional differences between their products and dairy. It said one poll indicated that more than half of consumers believe drinking alternative milk beverages has health benefits similar to consuming cow’s milk, despite quality varying widely across nondairy brands.
The draft guidance, written after more than 13,000 comments were collected by the FDA, hopes to address the “significant increase” in plant-based milk alternative products over the past decade, FDA Commissioner Robert M. Califf said in a statement. They aim to give consumers “information they need to make informed nutrition and purchasing decisions,” he added.
If the guidelines are formalized, they will mark a change for the FDA from its Trump-era position that “almonds do not lactate,” though it did not explicitly enforce the stance.
Paul Shapiro, chief executive of animal-free meat company BetterMeat, hailed the move, writing on Twitter that “sanity prevails.”
The FDA’s draft has not been universally welcomed. Sens. James E. Risch (R-Idaho) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), who represent states with large dairy industries, said in a joint statement Wednesday that the “misguided rule will hurt America’s dairy farmers and our rural communities.”
Jim Mulhern, head of the National Milk Producers Federation, called the proposal a “step toward labeling integrity” that acknowledges the “utter lack of nutritional standards prevalent in plant-based beverages.” But he criticized the suggested guidance on terminology, emphasizing that “dairy terms are for true dairy products, not plant-based impostors.”
Dan Weijers, who studies ethics and well-being at New Zealand’s University of Waikato, wrote in an email that “both sides probably think the ‘healthy daily beverage’ connotations of the word ‘milk’ translates into dollars in their pockets, and they’d be right.”
Nondairy milks have surged in popularity in recent years, with 1 in 3 U.S. households purchasing such products in 2016, according to the FDA. From 2016 to 2020, sales of plant-based milk products rose from $1.5 billion to $2.4 billion, the agency said.
Meanwhile, consumption of cow’s milk, measured on a per capita basis, has decreased by nearly half in the past 50 years, according to the Department of Agriculture.
For some, the kind of milk one drinks has evolved into a matter of identity. Firms making alternative milks have marketed their products in alignment with left-leaning youth culture. By contrast, some right-wing public figures have sworn off plant-based products. It is not unusual for Twitter users to signal political affiliation by milk product choice.
Indrawati Oey, a food science professor at New Zealand’s University of Otago, said in an email that while many people are “keen to reduce animal-based product consumption,” the promotion of plant-based alternatives can go “too far without well-informed labelling and guidance.”
“It is important to stress that protein quality is different between animal and plant sources even though you eat the same amount of protein,” she said.
When it comes to names, though, Weijers said “history is on the side of the soy and almonds.”
“Some nondairy beverages have been referred to as milks for hundreds of years,” he said.
