Buttergate, the Canadian dairy controversy that swept the world

Episode 91 of Down to Business podcast

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If you love your butter, but hate what it’s doing to your toast, then you need to know about Buttergate.

This week on Down to Business, Sylvain Charlebois, professor and director of the Agri-Food Analytics lab at Dalhousie university in Halifax, explained why there’s been a change in butter’s spreadability in Canada.

He and others have theorized that Canadian dairy farmers started using more palmitic acid in livestock feed as demand for butter increased during the pandemic; and that change is making butter physically harder.

The uproar this incited is being called Buttergate, and there are good reasons to care. First off, palm oil products raise serious ethical questions. My guest today also said Buttergate marks the first time he’s seen the Dairy Farmers of Canada respond to consumer concern so directly and this is important — ask farmers to stop using palmitic acid.

Buttergate is a story about Canada’s dairy business: how it controls prices and production through supply management, the industry’s Blue Cow logo campaign that promises quality local products, and about transparency in the global food chain.

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