Why is Milk So Pricey In Thailand?

[scubascuba3]

25 minutes ago, Surasak said:

Take a trip up to Chok Chai farm, North of Korat.. I have seen a few, but that is the biggest one I have seen. Forget all the Western cowboy stuff, that's just a way of making money. Ask to see the herd.

I'll get on the next bus

[BritManToo]

43 minutes ago, Surasak said:

There are dairy herds in Thailand, but they are not so prolific and certainly not Thai cows. Most of the dairy herds are imported from Australia, I believe.

I cycle past around 100 cows every morning. All out in fields in small groups, not the big herds we are used to in our home countries.

[placeholder]

Actually, many years ago there was sharp worldwide spike in the price of milk due to shortages. As the shortage issue was resolved, the prices in most of the world went back down. But not in Thailand. Odd, that.

[1FinickyOne]

why is it so cheap elsewhere? 

[WilliamSmits]

Moat milk here goes through a long chain, cow to churn, to pick up truck, to cooling station, to processor. Small volumes and labor intensive.

Then the price is controlled and the farm sector is well organised in coops with a strong connection to government and lots of votes. Maybe its better to be a farmer here?

[Delight]

 Thailand imports its milk.

From USA I think

 

 

For Thailand to produce its own milk -it would require:

Large Herds of cattle.

A Fleet of road tankers to transport the milk to the processors from the farms.

Demand  for milk from Thai nationals.

 

Thailand has non of the foregoing 

[Shmo]

19 hours ago, billd766 said:

AFAIR

 

Cows eat the grass and leave the roots to grow again.

 

Goats and sheep eat all of the grass and the roots which makes it harder for the grass to regrow. They get moved to a different area to allow regrowth of the grass.

Rotational grazing practiced by good dirt farmers

[Blueman1]

On 6/16/2024 at 1:19 AM, Chetzee said:

I dot think the UK SUBSIDICES   milk .... but I'm  absolutely sure that the supermarkets drive a very very hard bargain with the farmers who earn a few pence per Lt . Milk often a loss leader for the supermarkets .....

 

 

 

 Milk often a loss leader for the supermarkets .....NOT In Thailand though !!

[Blueman1]

11 minutes ago, Delight said:

 Thailand imports its milk.

From USA I think

 

 

For Thailand to produce its own milk -it would require:

Large Herds of cattle.

A Fleet of road tankers to transport the milk to the processors from the farms.

Demand  for milk from Thai nationals.

 

Thailand has non of the foregoing 

Thailand imports its milk.

From USA I think......Oh Go Away, It would be SOUR Before it got here.....

[ElwoodP]

2 minutes ago, Blueman1 said:

 Milk often a loss leader for the supermarkets .....NOT In Thailand though !!

In Thailand pepsi and coke are the loss leaders. (34bht for 2l in BigC)

[billd766]

13 hours ago, Bangkok Barry said:

 

Sounds reasonable, but these come and go at quite short intervals. I remain puzzled.

That was the only answer I could come up with.

 

Sorry.

[worgeordie]

Foremost stopped selling milk a couple of years ago ? , they had been  selling

fresh milk in Thailand since the Vietnam war, as they were set up to supply the

US armed forces , so it cannot be that profitable or they would still be doing it,

I buy and use dried milk from NZ , reconstitute it with water ,and it's very good,

222 Baht and makes 7 ltrs , so 34 B ltr plus the bottled water,but I think it's much

better milk anyway...

 

regards worgeordie

[PETERTHEEATER]

On 6/15/2024 at 11:04 PM, balo said:

Milk is not a part of the Thai diet. Very few locals drink it. So the production costs are higher in Thailand.  Just appreciate you can actually buy it in the stores.  Back in the 1970's that would have been impossible. 

My favorite is the Meiji brand. 
 

 

It's big business at schools level where local suppliers sell milk daily in small cartons. Milk with added vits and minerals is promoted as 'healthy' for children. As mentioned by another poster, some brands of milk are made up from reconstituted imported milk powder.

[daejung]

Not that expensive. In France the price of one liter may be 1  to 1,50 € or more depending on brands

In Thailand I pay 99,75  bahts for two  liters at Tops Market => 49,88 bahts per liter => around 1,27 € at current rate of exchange

[sandyf]

23 hours ago, billd766 said:

Goats and sheep eat all of the grass and the roots which makes it harder for the grass to regrow. They get moved to a different area to allow regrowth of the grass.

In 1970 Bill I  was posted to Sharjah. The Arabs used to feed the goats on cardboard boxes, and still got milk. "Recycling", before anyone had heard the word.

[Surasak]

4 hours ago, scubascuba3 said:

I'll get on the next bus

You do that. It will make change to get out into the countryside and breath some fresh air.

[Surasak]

4 hours ago, BritManToo said:

I cycle past around 100 cows every morning. All out in fields in small groups, not the big herds we are used to in our home countries.

That depend on the country you come from? I am not sure which states have large cow herds, but the Lone Star come to mind.

[Brewster67]

On 6/16/2024 at 12:08 AM, SteveJames said:

95-105 Baht for 2 Litres of Milk on Grab and in TOPS...  thats around £2.20 ... My mate just showed me £1.49 at Tescos in the UK.  I always noticed Milk was not cheap here, I call it "White Gold" in this house...But Why?   Do Dairy Cows go on Strike here?

Most milk is imported because of the low quality of the grass here.

 

It is very dry and not the correct type for grazing.

 

The UK has an excess of milk because they have the right type of grass for milk production.

[scubascuba3]

4 hours ago, BritManToo said:

I cycle past around 100 cows every morning. All out in fields in small groups, not the big herds we are used to in our home countries.

Do they look anorexic? are they in grass fields?

[BritManToo]

43 minutes ago, scubascuba3 said:

Do they look anorexic? are they in grass fields?

Most of them look like well groomed show animals. A bit skinny, but all Asian cows look like that to me.

[GroveHillWanderer]

Some massive amounts of misconceptions about the Thai dairy industry on this thread.

 

Thailand does not import most of its milk, and most of the milk sold here does not come from milk powder. Local milk production for example is getting on for ten times what is imported.

 

All the major brands (Meiji, ChokChai, Thai Danish etc) use pasteurised milk that comes from the over 300,000 dairy cows in Thailand. 

 

Quote

The number of dairy cows has increased from 13,700 to 358,247 cows over 40 years, whereas the amount of milk production has increased from 27,240 to 1,272,390 tons per years (Murphy and Tisdell, 1996; Department of Livestock Development, 2022).

 

Towards sustainability of the dairy industry in Thailand

 

 

[Madgee]

From my research:
UHT milk is made from powdered milk.
Pasteurised milk is fresh.

You've only got to look on the websites of the major milk producers to see this.

[BobBKK]

Don't drink it?  it wasn't designed for humans anyway.

[Ben Zioner]

On 6/16/2024 at 12:08 AM, SteveJames said:

I call it "White Gold" in this house...But Why?   

I guess it is because locals tend to have small "milk". I do enjoy the scarcity.

[GroveHillWanderer]

1 hour ago, Madgee said:

From my research:
UHT milk is made from powdered milk.
Pasteurised milk is fresh.

You've only got to look on the websites of the major milk producers to see this.

Do you have any links to those websites?

 

The ones I've looked at say their UHT milk is made from real cow's milk, not milk powder. 

 

Here's just two examples.

[Chris Daley]

Thai people don't know what to do with it.  They can't bake.  They don't know what pastry is.  They don't know what bread is.  Their ice cream is mostly vegetables.  They blend coffee with ice and add condensed milk instead of milk.  They don't know what tea or coffee is.

 

Therefore it is just seen as a foreign delicacy.

[Luk Oht]

It's all about the grass.  High quality grass requires cold temperatures to grow during the nighttime based on the carbohydrates (starches) generated during the day light hours by photosynthesis.  Hence in temperate climates the abundant grass can generate a lot of milk products from genetically selected dairy cattle.  There are very few locations in Thailand that can exclusively raise dairy cattle, which require large plots of (hundreds of acres / rai) land devoted to pasture (alfalfa, timothy, clover, trefoil) and hay - which are specialized crops.  These do not grow well on land converted from rice fields without a lot of effort to generate these crops sustainably and without specialized farm equipment or irrigation.  Salination of those rice fields, after generations of irrigation, further inhibits pasture species. 

 

I find that Thai milk tastes odd - because the grass being fed to cows in my home region of Canada gives the milk a certain taste, that I'm used to; so milk from anywhere else but your home region where you grew up will taste weird. Thai farmers often feed leaves from the "Gatin" tree as they are high in nitrogen and protein - but taste very strong and bitter.  You are what you eat - so dairy cows give milk in taste, quality and quantity based on what they eat.  

 

Keep in mind, that traditionally, Thai farmers relied on rice production, not only for their economic livelihood, but also for survival of the family during times of drought, or when flooding killed their other food crops.  It is a bold farmer who will give up rice production in favour of growing grass that they cannot personally consume, and that is only used by cattle that are too expensive to kill and eat.  Although they never wanted to kill the family water buffalo, they would if the family was starving.

 

Thai families traditionally give children milk until they are about two years old - but after that, hardly anyone, certainly not adults will drink milk, so the market for dairy milk is quite limited. Shockingly-sweetened milk seems to be an attempt to have people buy milk instead of soda pop and other sweetened drinks. 

 

 

[khunPer]

On 6/15/2024 at 7:08 PM, SteveJames said:

95-105 Baht for 2 Litres of Milk on Grab and in TOPS...  thats around £2.20 ... My mate just showed me £1.49 at Tescos in the UK.  I always noticed Milk was not cheap here, I call it "White Gold" in this house...But Why?   Do Dairy Cows go on Strike here?

Mild is cheap in Thailand, be happy you don't live in Denmark, one litre is 13.75 DKK; i.e., 70 baht or 140 baht for 2 litres...

[gamb00ler]

15 hours ago, koolkarl said:

Everything has become pricey in Thailand. Prices this year alone have increased 10 to 20% right across the board and the friendly politicians keep brainwashing you that there is no inflation so they can reward you 1% per annum on your time deposit!!  Soon the natives will get restless...

I disagree.  I remember prices very well and during my 3½ years in CM most staples that I buy are up 10% or less (about 3% a year).  Prepared food prices have risen much more than the price of ingredients.  Almost all my meals are home cooked so I remember the ingredient prices reliably.

 

Makro's pricing sometimes seems strange.  A package of Meiji brand individual servings of yogurt have alternated between 48฿ and 58฿ many times over the past couple of months.  That doesn't make sense to me.

[Lorry]

58 minutes ago, gamb00ler said:

during my 3½ years in CM most staples that I buy are up 10% or less (about 3% a year)

We are being told Thailand has deflation,  prices are supposedly sinking.