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Company behind lab-grown milk protein eyes Canadian animal-free dairy market

An Israeli food tech company says it now has the green light to sell its lab-grown milk protein to dairy manufacturers and food companies in Canada.

Remilk said Monday it received a "letter of no objection" from Health Canada regarding its version of the BLG protein, which can be used as a non-animal source ingredient in products that look and taste like traditional milk, cheese, yogurt and ice cream.

The protein is equivalent to its cow-derived counterpart but no animals are involved in its creation through a process called precision fermentation, the company said, adding that it's seeking a Canadian partner to help launch and distribute its product.

Animal-free dairy is more environmentally sustainable than traditional dairy production, and it also doesn't contain lactose, cholesterol or growth hormones, Remilk said.

A notice posted on Health Canada's website confirms the federal agency has no objection to the use of the animal-free milk protein in food, and no safety concerns.

Health Canada received a submission in 2022 to allow the sale of the BLG protein produced from a genetically modified yeast strain and scientists conducted a thorough analysis of the data Remilk provided, the notice said.

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Selling Hay for 40 Years: Fritz Trauttmansdorff, Dunlea Farms

Video: Selling Hay for 40 Years: Fritz Trauttmansdorff, Dunlea Farms



Fritz Trauttmansdorff came to Canada from Austria in 1980, bought a 45-cow dairy farm at Jerseyville, and within two years had more hay than he knew what to do with. He sold the quota in 1986, went debt-free, and built a hay business that has kept some of the same customers for forty years. Today Dunlea Farms runs about 2,500 acres — roughly 600 of it hay, the rest IP soybeans and grain corn — and Fritz makes the case that hay isn't the crop you grow when grain doesn't work. It's the crop that makes the grain work.

"If you grow corn, soybeans and wheat, you're on a three-wheeler. If you put hay in the rotation, you're on a four-wheeler."

WHAT WE COVER • Why the hay market moves independently of the Chicago Board — and what that does for farm-level risk
• The real cost of a mistake: five bushels in grain, versus the whole crop in hay
• Getting a second job out of the same iron — planting tractors that mow all summer, tillage tractors that bale
• How a grain farmer can get hay into the rotation without buying a single piece of hay equipment
• Drilling Timothy in the fall and double-cropping soybeans into it the next June
• What it actually takes to go all-in: roughly 500 acres, good sheds, and a baler you didn't buy used
• Local, regional and international hay markets — and choosing which one you're building for
• Why 40-year customer relationships are the asset, not the equipment