Milk

Before dawn each day, Gao Penghong and his wife join scores of other farmers in this dairy-rich village who must walk their cows to a local milk collection station because of new safety requirements. A byproduct of China's deadly tainted-milk scandal, the mile-long walks to the station come as officials push for more critical supervision of dairy farmers. Only weeks ago, farmers were free to milk their cows at home and deliver the product in heavy metal containers.

Five years ago, dairy farmer Leroy Shatto was struggling to stay in business. Today, his herd has more than doubled amid a surge in demand for his product. The difference: a marketing campaign touting Shatto milk as free of artificial hormones. Osborn, Mo.-based Shatto milk comes plain or flavored, but all comes from cows free of the genetically engineered hormone supplements that many conventional dairies give cows to boost their milk production.

Got goat's milk? Northern California ice cream maker Laura Howard does and she's using it to turn out a product that's anything but plain vanilla. Howard's goat-milk frozen treats are winning shelf space in upscale grocery freezers across the country. And here's the kicker: They don't taste of goat. "Some people see goats' milk ice cream and they sort of wrinkle their nose," said Howard, who traded Hollywood for the country charms of Petaluma to start her Laloo's Goat's Milk Ice Cream Co.

Under pressure from supermarket chains and their customers, California cows are going drug-free. The giant Central Valley dairy co-op that produces 4 of every 10 glasses of milk drunk by Californians is phasing out the use of a synthetic bovine growth hormone that increases how much milk cows produce. Despite evidence that the rBST hormone doesn't harm humans, California Dairies Inc. said its biggest customers such as Vons and Safeway didn't want it in the cows.

Market forecasters are warning of a sharp increase in dairy prices this summer. Prices paid to farmers have increased 50% this year -- driven by higher costs of transporting milk to market and increased demand for corn to produce ethanol. U.S. retail milk prices have increased about 3%, or roughly a dime a gallon, this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Kroger Co., the nation's largest traditional grocery company and operator of the Ralphs chain in Southern California, is marketing a new milk brand for its cholesterol-reducing potential. The product, under Kroger's Active Lifestyle brand, is billed as the first national launch of a cholesterol-cutting milk. It adds to Kroger's expanding lines for consumers of health-conscious and natural or organic foods and the in-house brands that the company sees as an important part of its profit strategy.

Federal regulators have turned down a request from Monsanto Co. to take action against dairy companies that advertise milk as free of synthetic hormones. The Federal Trade Commission said last week that the ads it reviewed did not make any misleading claims about the safety of recombinant bovine somatotropin, or rBST, a hormone that boosts milk production in cows.

California's cheese manufacturers say they are being squeezed out of hundreds of millions of dollars by dairy farmers, and they want the state to change the complex formula used to determine the price they pay for milk. Cheese makers claim that the current formula, changed four years ago when dairies were struggling with low milk prices, could drive smaller plants out of business because it raises the cost of making cheese in a competitive market where it is hard to recoup the added expense.

Got a problem with milk? Better not rip off the industry's well-known marketing slogan to express it. Milk processors are demanding that People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals end a publicity campaign that asks, "Got pus? Milk does." PETA, which advocates a dairy-free diet, has plastered the slogan on T-shirts, mugs and other merchandise to draw attention to what it says are dangerous levels of somatic cells -- pus -- in much of the milk sold in this country.