| Oh yeah, the good cheese is definitely not cheap. Luckily, i'm a cheddar fan and costco has a 3 and 5 year old brick for under $10. Very interesting article about the subject that touches a lot of the facets of this market. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-commen... "Until last May, it was importing cheaper U.S. milk-protein concentrates as ingredients, displacing domestic milk. It temporarily halted the imports, however, after regulators in Canada created a new class of lower-priced industrial milk destined specifically for cheese and yogurt production. The solution is a stop-gap measure, however, that cannot be sustained without permanent subsidies or raising prices on other dairy products." Then, in relation to MPC's, here's a snippet from Wikipedia "In the US dairy farmers are protected from international competitors with a range of measures, including tariffs on imports. MPCs however are not subject to a tariff rate quota, so most MPCs used are imported[citation needed]. “The United States imports of MPCs have doubled in the last five years, and between 2007 and 2008 MPC imports increased 66 percent.”[11] The majority of these imports come from New Zealand, totaling $250 million worth of MPC imported worldwide.[11] US dairy producer groups claim that foreign manufacturers using nonfat dry milk in the production of MPC are circumventing existing quotas on nonfat dry milk.[12][13] Further concern arises as MPCs are largely unregulated.[11]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk_protein_concentrate |