Resource Type: Media Coverage

You’re strolling the aisles of your local market. You arrive at the cool, glowing refrigerator cases of the dairy section, poised to make a quick decision about what you’ll pour into your next glass of homemade boba or rich batch of pots de crème.

Organic dairy and other livestock farmers are seeking emergency federal aid as they grapple with skyrocketing organic feed costs, steep fuel and utility expenses as well as the consequences of drought in many parts of the country.

One agricultural customer that chooses to pay for clean energy on its utility bills is Straus Family Creamery.

Straus Family Creamery founder and CEO Albert Straus isn’t waiting. He plans to incorporate Brominata into the everyday diet at Straus Dairy Farm by the end of 2023, part of his goal to make the farm carbon neutral by that deadline.

Milk is familiar to most of us. Not just a drink for children, it’s also often consumed by adults and is of course one of the key ingredients at cafés. But you may be unfamiliar with the processing that milk undergoes before reaching the market, and one such process is homogenization.

After decades of growing demand, drought and a far-away war are laying low local organic dairy farmers and processors.  Without cash soon, it’s feared several local dairy operators may soon close up shop.

When it comes to climate change, cows have taken a reputational hit. These belching bovines have been villainized for releasing methane, a greenhouse gas with more than 25 times the heat-trapping power of carbon dioxide.

The Straus Family Creamery, an organic dairy producer in Marin County, California, made headlines last fall after receiving approval from regulatory agencies to conduct a trial of a new seaweed-derived feed additive called Brominata.

If you are eating “animal-free” dairy or meat products that taste nearly identical to a traditional animal product, you should be asking plenty of questions.

And more often than not, what you will discover is that these foods are anything but “natural.”

Thousands of dairy farms worldwide have worked to reduce carbon emissions over the last few years, if not for much longer, but only 4 have made a public commitment to being carbon neutral by a given date.

California dairy farms will soon be able to feed their cows seaweed to fight climate change after the state Department of Food and Agriculture approved the use of a seaweed feed shown to reduce methane emissions from cow burps, the first in the U.S. to do so.

Albert Straus, an organic dairy farmer in Marin County, California, made it his intention to look at how he could meet those goals and what it would take on his dairy farm to do just that. He wanted to be progressive, forward-thinking and a part of the solution.

At a Marin dairy farm this summer, cows got a little something extra in their organic hay and alfalfa: a sprinkle of seaweed powder that holds promise for helping the state achieve ambitious climate goals.

In his dungarees and rubber boots, Albert Straus looked every bit the dairy farmer that he is. On this particular morning, however, the 66-year-old founder and CEO of Straus Family Creamery was some 25 miles from his family farm.

In 2021, an increasing number of water providers across California will be forced to prepare for water shortages as the state’s drought intensifies. For some locales, this could mean mandatory or voluntary restrictions on residential water use.

When it comes to the bodies of humans and animals, there are a few functions that we’re usually discouraged from talking about. Specifically, the ones that involve releasing gas. (Yep, burps and farts.)

Beef and dairy production are considered important drivers of climate change, contributing roughly 5% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, mostly in the form of methane released by cattle and other ruminant animals.

What does a small trash bin tucked in the corner of a Straus Family Creamery executive office have to do with climate change?

In one of his first acts in office, President Biden said he wants farmers and ranchers to tell him how to fight climate change. If he wants to hear from agricultural businesses already on the front lines of combating global warming, the Bay Area might be a good place to start.

A new study out of the University of California at Davis shows a dramatic reduction in cattle methane emissions using red seaweed as a feed supplement. It also significantly reduced the cost of feed. The five-month study found that these reductions were sustained with no change in animal health or in the quality of the beef.

Since taking over management of the family’s California dairy farm, in 1977, Albert Straus has used it as a force for change, becoming the first 100% certified organic, zero-waste, non-GMO creamery in North America, processing milk from about a dozen partner farms.

Our region will someday emerge from the pandemic with a fresh way of thinking about the way we live and the way we use, share and value our resources, especially food. The accelerated change taking place now is a chance for us to reprioritize our values toward a local, sustainable, organic farming and food production system.

For decades, we have enjoyed a productive agricultural landscape and farming model for the rest of the country, amid wild open space at Point Reyes National Seashore.

You probably make a shopping list before you head to the supermarket. Since we’re heading into a new year, we thought it’d be fun to find out what foods and drinks will likely be on your shopping list in 2020.