Mothers of Ireland: Do you know how much breastmilk is worth?

Ireland produces 15% of the world’s infant formula, but mother’s milk is worth more

Everyone’s talking about the cows while celebrating the lifting of the quota, making farmers free to produce as much milk as they like for the first time in 31 years. 20 per cent of this will be made into infant formula with the Chinese market being targeted.

Ireland produces 15 per cent of the world’s supply of infant formula, feeding one in seven of the world’s babies. Yet mother’s milk is worth considerably more than cows’ milk - up to $2.50 per ounce in the US on the many websites set up for the selling, donating and purchasing of breastmilk. And there’s never been a quota. You can produce as much as you like. In China, the super-rich are paying thousands of euro per month for frozen breastmilk.

In the US, where the trend took off, a lactating woman who is no longer feeding her own children can profit. Sales of breastmilk are booming as mothers who are either unable to breastfeed, or too busy, want to buy the best food for their babies. With a six-month old infant requiring 30 oz per day at $2.50 per ounce, that’s a tidy profit of $65 per day for a mother producing 30oz daily. (If you’re interested, you freeze it in bags and sell it online at sites such as onlythebreast.com)

Some women do make more milk than their own babies need. At the Coombe Hospital, a friend recalls, there was a mother going around producing so much nourishment that she was offering it enthusiastically to others who were having difficulty. And why not?

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Breastfed babies are said to have higher IQs, fewer allergies, protection from diabetes, eczema, gastrointestinal disease plus a host of other advantages. The research proves it. The WHO recommends that mothers breastfeed for the first two years. This isn’t convenient for economically booming countries like China who want mothers in the workforce, nor for Ireland where six out of ten women believe they “can’t” breastfeed, despite their Irish breasts (one photographer of nudes informs us) being the most ample in the world.

If every Irish mother of a nursing infant (there are 72,000 of you) were producing a mere eight extra ounces per day, that would be a daily profit of millions, although the Government would probably tax it.

Imagine what the upwardly mobile Chinese will pay for it, when they’re willing to spend €50 on a can of infant formula produced in an Irish factory. The wealthiest Chinese are already paying more than €2,000 per month for breast milk and even advertising for wet-nurses.

Yet despite all the nourishment, health value and sheer human beauty in Irish women’s lactating breasts, Ireland’s baby formula production sector is growing at up to 6 per cent a year.

Promoting breastfeeding isn’t convenient for the food sector. Irish maternity hospitals give infant formula away for free. It’s akin to heads of state and celebrities having a pint of Guinness put in their gob the moment they arrive here. “Welcome to the world of processed food, baby, now we’ve got you for life” seems to be the marketing approach.

All mothers want the best for their babies, so if like six out of ten Irish women you are choosing not to breastfeed (Irish women have the lowest breastfedding rate in Europe, by the way) you could purchase mother’s milk from other mothers. It’s a market just waiting to be milked. Currently, some Irish mothers donate their milk to the Milk Bank at Irvinestown, Co Fermanagh, which provides breast milk for more than 5,500 premature and sick babies who need the real thing in order to thrive, on both sides of the border.

It’s ironic, that the Irish dairy industry with its green credentials – bolstered by Bord Bia’s Origin Green project – promotes its dairy products as prestige brands, while the most valuable, sustainable and green milk product of all – breastmilk – lacks prestige amongst Irish mothers. Could this be because it’s free? Or because the infant formula advertising is so clever?

Three of the world’s largest infant formula manufacturers have extensive operations in Ireland. Glanbia Ingredients has just spent €235 million on a new Belview plant – the biggest Irish company investment in 80 years – to produce specialised milk powder products, much of it for infant formula with the 70 million infants aged 0-3 in China as a target. At the launch, the Taoiseach Enda Kenny was photographed feeding a baby with formula, reinforcing the message that lucrative baby formula is the way to go.

By 2020, Glanbia’s 4,800 milk supplies will have increased milk production by 63 per cent with many of its products selling to 50 countries, many in the Third World, where mothers will be purchasing what they could give their babies for free. Up to 15 per cent of deaths in children under five are caused by mothers not exclusively breastfeeding in the first six months of life in developing countries, says the WHO.

There are few things as profitable as selling mothers a product they don’t actually need. So if you enjoy breastfeeding, which is actually very pleasant once you get the hang of it after those first few difficult weeks, your breasts are your factory for spreading a truly green and sustainable product.