Last year, Arla Foods found itself in a social media storm of misinformation over its trial of feed additive Bovaer. What has been the fallout since?

Tesco’s announcement last July seemed pretty innocuous. In an almost jaunty release headed ‘Moo-sic to our ears’, the retailer revealed it had teamed up with one of its dairy farms to trial methane-reducing feed supplement Bovaer.

Developed by Dutch-Swiss life sciences company DSM-Firmenich, Bovaer was shown to reduce methane emissions in dairy cows by up to 30%, Tesco said.

With Defra data showing agriculture represented about 49% of the UK’s methane emissions, here was a solution – added to the feed of 400 cows at Tesco Sustainable Dairy Group member Grosvenor Farms in Cheshire – that could have a “significant effect on emissions reduction in our supply chain”, the grocer added.

Then on 26 November, Arla Foods announced it had started its own trial of Bovaer – in collaboration with Tesco, Aldi and Morrisons – across almost 30 of its UK farms.

Feed additives like Bovaer had “huge potential” in tackling methane emissions, said Arla UK agriculture director Paul Dover.

“Bringing partners together from across the food and grocery industry in this kind of initiative highlights the support there is for British farmers in transitioning to more sustainable farming methods,” he commented.

But within hours of the news going live, thousands of users on social media platform X were making unsubstantiated claims Bovaer was unsafe. Arla and its key brands, such as Lurpak and Cravendale, trended amid a clamour to boycott the dairy co-op’s products.

So, why did this happen? How did it affect Arla? And what impact has it had on the industry’s efforts to cut methane emissions?

Bovaer is a brand name for the additive 3-nitrooxypropanol, or 3-NOP. It suppresses the enzymes that produce methane in a cow’s gut as it digests food. Crucially, DSM-Firmenich claims there is no impact on animal welfare.

Dutch dairy co-op FrieslandCampina was an early adopter, launching a large-scale pilot across 158 farms in 2022. It led to a decrease of 10,000 tonnes of CO2e in methane emissions (representing an average of 28% less enteric methane emissions).

That result ultimately “opened the door” for Bovaer to be rolled out across the entire Dutch dairy herd, the supplier said in 2023. “This move towards sustainability in the Dutch dairy industry will benefit farmers and consumers alike,” it added.

However, any hopes of a similarly positive outcome for Arla went out of the window last year, as online calls to #BoycottArla reached fever pitch. Among a slew of unsubstantiated claims, Bovaer was decried as “poison”, “net zero bullshit” and a “human drug trial”, with its use leading to “plastic milk”.

Many more incorrectly linked it to the popular conspiracy theory centred on the World Economic Forum’s desire to create a world government and depopulate the planet. There were even claims that billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates was the mastermind behind the project.

A history of misinformation about the dairy industry

Conspiracy theories and misinformation like that surrounding Bovaer are not a new problem for the dairy industry.

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Source: Getty Images

In 1946, Lord Victor Rothschild advocated for the compulsory pasteurisation of milk in the UK. His noble aim was to protect the health of all Brits. But crackpots have long insisted Rothschild’s sinister plan was to lessen milk’s nutritional value, thereby leading to a weakened, docile population.

This argument against pasteurisation often crops up online among advocates of raw milk – consumption of which can lead to diarrhoea, vomiting and even Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a neurological disorder that affects the nerves.

Other internet oddballs insist schoolkids in the US used to be given milk not for nutrition but as part of a plot to secretly clear a federal milk surplus. That was also the aim of the nationwide ‘Got Milk?’ push launched in the 1990s, apparently.

Ever wondered why pizza chains began to make stuffed crusts? It’s because the US government had a glut of cheese it wanted to shift – or so conspiracists say.

Other claims are less amusing. Take Switch4Good, an American organisation that promotes alt-dairy as the healthier option. Cows milk has “been linked to obesity, hormone-dependent cancers, diabetes, osteoporosis and heart disease”, it warns.

Plus, it “could actually make bones more brittle, not stronger” and has been linked to “increased risk of ovarian cancer”.

Sadly, it certainly won’t be the last misinformation to hit the dairy industry.

A storm of misinformation

The misinformation spread like wildfire – as did videos of protesters pouring Arla products down the toilet. And calls to boycott Arla’s retail partners raged.

Some people selectively highlighted Bovaer’s ­run-of-the-mill usage instructions, which contained handling precautions – standard for a host of farm inputs and even household cleaning products – that advised that the product was an eye and skin irritant and harmful if inhaled.

Others claimed the government was in on the conspiracy, citing a 2023 Defra consultation paper that suggested all suitable British cattle should be given Bovaer or Bovaer-like products by 2030 and was an “essential tool to decarbonise the agricultural sector”.

Arla initially declined to engage with the controversy when approached by The Grocer for comment. But as more and more news outlets began to pick up the story, the company finally reacted on 28 November. Focusing on the Bill Gates claim, the dairy giant stated it was “completely false and inaccurate”.

Gates had, in fact, been involved in the funding of an unrelated Australian methane inhibitor called Rumin8, which is not regulated for use in the UK. Bovaer, on the other hand, is approved by British regulators and those in 29 other countries.

Still, the controversy has persisted. Despite the FSA and Defra stressing Bovaer is safe for use and does not harm animals (with the additive metabolised by cows so it does not pass into the milk), its use continues to provoke angry reactions from certain portions of society.

Part of the problem stemmed from the language used in the announcement. Arla’s use of the term “trial” was a particular issue, says Nick Wheelhouse, a professor of comparative infectious disease at Edinburgh Napier University. He is also a trustee of the British Society of Animal Science and chairs the FSA Advisory Committee on Animal Feedingstuffs – which approved Bovaer for use in the UK.

 

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Using that word “made it seem as if people would be sampling something experimental, whereas there are 79 research papers alone on [scientific literature search engine] PubMed on Bovaer going back to 2016”, Wheelhouse points out. “It’s probably one of the most extensively researched feed additives there has ever been.

“This sort of product undergoes incredible scrutiny,” he adds. The weight of evidence required for such a product to be approved for use is significant, he stresses – given the main concern of his FSA committee is safety “for the consumer, the animal and the environment”.

Had Arla instead said it aimed to evaluate the use of Bovaer, controversy may well have been avoided, suggests David Wilde, national ruminant technical manager at animal nutrition specialist Massey Feeds, and a fellow BSAS trustee.

“Other businesses have used Bovaer and they continue to use it. That just went under the radar because there was no big public announcement,” he says.

At the time of Arla’s crisis, Massey Feeds received many calls from farmers along the lines of “are you using it?” and “you better not be using it”. In response, Wilde would tell them: “We’re not, as we haven’t been asked to.”

He adds now: “It’s a perfectly safe and authorised product. So, if someone wants to use it, we would consider bringing it in and incorporating it in feed accordingly, should there be sufficient demand.”

For Dairy UK CEO Judith Bryans, the Bovaer backlash has proven with “chilling, crystal ­clarity” that “misinformation and conspiracy theories are not just to be found on dark corners of social media. They exist on our doorsteps, even at our farmgates.”

Distrust around Bovaer was prevalent across the farming sector too, confirms rural historian and farmer Oli Fletcher, who fronts a YouTube channel called Farming Explained.

When he attempted to cut through the noise about the feed additive last December with an explainer video, he was met with accusations of being everything from an “Arla shill” to a “blatant liar”.

And many in the farming sector are still talking about the controversy almost a year later, Fletcher says. While visiting the Groundswell regenerative agriculture festival over the summer, a sustainability consultant told him: “We need to have native grass-fed beef in the UK, rather than these animals fed Bovaer, because it’s an explosive.”

Waving away the unsubstantiated “explosive” claim – which echoes the misinformation peddled by conspiracy theorists on social media – Fletcher says much of the hostility towards Bovaer is from advocates of sustainable and organic farming.

At the heart of the enmity is the belief Bovaer’s use “doesn’t fit within the prevailing narrative of environmentalism, which is ‘pro-nature’ rather than ‘pro-scientific intervention’”.

This ideology, Fletcher says, is “often about winding down agriculture” and is set against Bovaer’s ability to offer a solution that can help maintain dairy production “while having a significant cooling effect on the climate in the short to medium term”.

In Fletcher’s view, Bovaer “allows the industry to continue, it safeguards all the jobs, it means we can keep enjoying the nutritional benefits of dairy”, he adds. “But because it’s not ‘pro-nature’, most ­environmentalists don’t really compute that it works as a solution.”

To support his claim, Fletcher points to the roots of environmentalism and organic farming in the UK as being a “fascist movement” more concerned about nature recovery than feeding a growing global population.

Fascist is an extreme term. But the organic sector is undoubtedly wary of Bovaer. The Soil Association, for example, was quick to intervene in the Bovaer controversy by emphatically stating it did not permit its use on its approved organic dairy farms.

Arla’s cause was further hobbled by numerous rival dairy businesses also distancing themselves from the additive. Some of that messaging was reactive amid a deluge of enquiries. Others, such as from Scottish supplier McQueens and many more smaller operators, made a point of stressing their products were Bovaer-free as a key point of difference in their marketing.

‘Not a silver bullet’

On top of the concerns over safety, the polarising nature of Bovaer also extends to its effectiveness as a methane inhibitor.

DSM-Firmenich had been “desperate” to get its product to market in a bid to secure a return on its hefty investment, one dairy sector insider tells The Grocer. “It was rushed to market, somebody didn’t think through the PR consequences, and as a result, this debacle has had a hugely negative effect on both Arla and DSM.”

Arla had been naive to believe it was “an easy option” in meeting methane reduction targets, the source adds. “Products like this should be going into any emissions reduction strategy at the end of the process, not the start.

“Improvements in genetics and husbandry should be rolled out first so that you have cumulative reductions in emissions. That will also be more economically beneficial to the farmer and their customer, too. Bovaer isn’t a silver bullet.”

The sentiment is shared by Helen Dent, sustainability lead at Kite Consulting. “If you put Bovaer in at the start, before these other actions, the absolute reduction in emissions is going to reduce year on year, but the cost will stay the same or even increase over the course of a five-year period,” she says.

There are also questions about the efficacy of Bovaer within largely grass-fed cow herds, Dent adds, due to the need for it to be present in “every mouthful” of feed.

So, it will have a more effective impact in cows that spend most of their time indoors mainly eating compound feeds.

Wyke Farms MD Rich Clothier is even more forceful. Bovaer is a “lazy man’s solution to a complex problem that can only be addressed through attention to detail, really good herd health and management, with no shortcuts”, he argues.

The complex nature is also highlighted by Dairy UK’s Bryans. Bovaer and other feed additives do “have a place in our collective armoury”, she says, but “they are not a panacea, and they will not be suitable for every business”.

Bryans also highlights Defra’s most recent Agri-climate Report, published in February, as testament to the work already done to tackle emissions via the Dairy Roadmap initiative. Data shows dairy’s emissions intensity decreased 22% between 1990 and 2022, while also recording a 12.5% absolute reduction in methane emissions.

Interest remains

As for the future prospects of feed additives, Wheelhouse doubts the Bovaer furore will impact their wider development globally.

“There is still massive investment internationally and real interest in them, so it hasn’t put people off those efforts,” he says. “But a lesson learnt for this kind of announcement is that it can lead to some form of public kickback” without the right communication strategy.

The government also stands by the use of feed additives. Defra aims to “develop a stable market for methane suppressant feed and make compulsory the use of safe and effective products by cattle farmers in England by 2030, at the latest”.

Arla, on the other hand, has been somewhat less emphatic. In February, it told The Grocer the Bovaer crisis had not had a material impact on sales, which climbed by 0.7% to €13.8bn last year. UK managing director Bas Padberg has stressed on several occasions that “Bovaer is part of the future” and “is a solution that can help us produce milk with less impact on the environment”.

But what is more telling about this whole affair is that Arla’s trial of the feed additive is now largely over in the UK. A spokesperson told The Grocer in August that “the majority of the projects have concluded”.

Arla is now “taking the time to review its findings”. And who wouldn’t bet, after such a strong backlash last year, that its decision is to walk away?

Supermarkets accused of overlooking methane

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Source: Getty Images

Despite the furore around Bovaer, methane emissions in meat and dairy supply chains are still a “major blind spot” for supermarkets, say Changing Markets and Mighty Earth.

A report published by the campaign groups in May found a raft of retailers globally were not acting on their methane gas emissions. That’s despite the two categories representing one-third of their total emissions.

Of the top 20 retailers – including Carrefour, Ahold Delhaize, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda and Walmart – not one reported their methane emissions or had set reduction targets, the Methane Action Tracker report claimed.

It has since emerged Dutch chain Albert Heijn started reporting this data in a “world first”, earlier this year.

The campaign group tracker, which measures progress against indicators such as emissions reporting and reduction action plans, revealed that Tesco was the UK’s best performer.

However, its efforts scored only 51/100 – meaning much more work needed to be done.

“Retailers are uniquely positioned to urgently drive down agricultural methane emissions in their supply chains,” Mighty Earth said.

“That starts with being honest about the impact of the products they sell and working harder and faster to reduce that impact.”

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