Title: Milking Economies: Multi-Species Imbrications In The Infant Formula Industry – By Claudia Hirtenfelder & Carolyn Prouse

Description: Melbourne 28th Oct @ 1pm
Kingston 27th Oct @ 10pm
Vienna 28th Oct @ 4am
In 2016 the Chinese infant formula company Feihe International signed a deal with the Canadian Dairy Commission (CDC) to invest $225 million in the Canadian dairy market. Feihe has since built a plant in Kingston, Ontario, to process Canadian cows’ and goats’ milk for infant formula. We draw on this case study to unpack some of the multispecies entanglements that underpin transnational markets in dairy-based infant formula. We use a postcolonial, posthumanist analytic to show how cows, goats and humans are entangled through the pursuit of for-profit markets in infant formula. Methodologically, we imbricate different sets of entanglements that underpin this milk economy: entanglements of purity circulating race, nation, and species with entanglements of motherhood circulating science, technology, and branding. Our method involves analyzing official correspondence between CDC, Feihe, and Kingston; market reports for the dairy, goat, and infant formula industries; and news articles about the Feihe infant formula plant. We read these empirics through literature in animal studies, geography, posthumanism, and postcolonial studies. In so doing, we unmask and de-fetishize infant formula,showing some of the messy, multispecies entanglements and social relations that shape transnational dairy industries.
 

https://www.dcasn.com/2021/2021/6/9/milkingeconomies

Date: 28 October 2021 1:00 pm EDT EDT