Milk prices soar – because more people can afford it (great!)

From the Progress-Happens desk (actually, the NY Times):

But the biggest force driving up milk prices is the same one that has driven up prices for conventional commodities like iron ore and copper: a roaring global economy. Rising incomes in emerging economies from China and India to Latin America and the Middle East are lifting millions of people out of poverty and into the middle class.

It turns out that, along with zippy cars and flat-panel TVs, milk is the mark of new money, a significant source of protein that factors into much of any affluent person’s diet. Milk goes into infant formulas, chocolate, ice cream and cheese. Most baked goods contain butter, and coffee chains like Starbucks sell more milk than coffee.

Just meeting that demand, said Alex Duncan, an economist at Fonterra, the dominant dairy cooperative in New Zealand and one of the world’s largest dairy-exporting companies, will require the addition each year of the equivalent of New Zealand’s entire annual milk output.

Wayne Arnold, A Thirst for Milk Bred by New Wealth Sends Prices Soaring, NY Times, Sept. 4, 2007.

As problems go, this isn’t an entirely-bad one to have; I can imagine all sorts of good things resulting from it.