UN Promoting Camel's Milk to the Western World

Well this is new to me, I must admit I know next to nothing about camel's milk. But if the United Nations (UN) Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has its way that may have to change. An unnamed spokeswoman for the British Nutrition Foundation said: "Camel's milk could be a useful addition to the diet as it contains calcium and B vitamins and is lower in saturated fat than cow's milk."

So health food shops in the UK could soon be stocking camel’s milk on their shelves following the call by the UN to supply the so-called 'super food'. Camel’s milk is drunk widely in the Arab world and praised for its health benefits including increased levels of vitamins B and C and almost ten times the level of iron than cow’s milk.

Of course, the main troubles with cow's milk are its high levels of allergens, mucogenic quality, indigestable sugar content for many people (lactogen) and generally poor digestibility, as well as the bad fat content in whole milk. Add to this its close and probably causal relationship with osteoporosis, the complete opposite of what most people who learned physiology from the milk marketers will tell you, and one has to wonder why the UN is promoting more animal milk for human consumption.

Well, wonder no more. It isn't really about nutrition. In keeping with unfortunate trends the UN is becoming little more than a marketing organization. The FAO has called on producers to begin looking at the potentially lucrative markets in Europe and the Americas and has called on producers and investors to help develop the market. FAO spokesperson Anthony Bennett acknowledged improvements in the supply chain would be needed to bring the supply to the Western world, but said the return will be beneficial for Arab countries.

The market is estimated to be worth about £5.6 billion with millions more potential customers in the Western world. "The potential is massive. Milk is money," Mr Bennett said. Camel's milk certainly has great potential in the UK market, with both Harrods and Fortnum and Mason already expressing interest in supplying the product.

Now I understand why that spokeswoman for the British Nutrition Foundation didn't want to be named. This may be in Britain now but with the UN's FAO involved with the marketing it could spread quite rapidly, though where massive camel milk an be supplied from I have no idea. Just remember that this is about money, not nutrition, and be prepared for the inevitable onslaught of scientific studies extolling the health virtues of camel's milk.

Remember, human milk for babies and infants, solid whole foods for everyone else. There literally is absolutely no need for dairy products to maintain good health, no matter what the gospel according to food pyramids says.

So, how do you take your milk ... one hump ot two?