I live in the town of Rockingham, Vermont – and we’ve been taking care of our own weekly trash for as long as I can remember. (Sometimes I would look longingly at the trash cans waiting on Fridays in Westminster.) From time to time we would hire a service – but usually we just recycle. And I’m such a nut about no-Styrofoam-cloth-napkins-cloth diapers-etc that we just don’t have much trash.

So it was a real surprise when we took on a formula-fed-paper-diapered baby for a week. I couldn’t believe the trash!

Ecologist Sandra Steingraber, in  Americans Who Tell the Truth notes that “family routines are inextricably connected to public health issues.” How’s that for a heavy statement – how can it be true? Let’s take a look at what that looks like when it comes to infant feeding choices.

I love being part of the Slow Food Movement!
I love being part of the Slow Food Movement!

You know all the schtick about breastfeeding – it’s free, it comes in charming containers, it’s always the right temperature and always available, etc etc. But the converse – what does feeding formula look like? – can be pretty surprising even here in the United States, to say nothing of other countries around the world.

Most formula for babies is made with cow’s milk. We mess around with the “formula” or recipe a lot, but that’s the base: cow’s milk with additives.

So what’s the big deal? What does it mean to manufacture formula for sale?

  •  Mammals make milk for their own young. That means that we really need to mess around with cow’s milk if we want our babies to have a chance at any kind of health. For example, human milk has an average of 22 calories per ounce – cow’s milk has 19. So the formula companies add the oils to get the fat content up. (And actually – they are now switching to 19 calorie formulas because of the contribution of overfeeding formula to the fat epidemic. That demands more recipe-tinkering, because of the essential fatty acids that babies need.) Chemicals and patented products are added – in fairly large quantities – because babies need vitamins and minerals and essential fatty acids. And the baby’s body can’t easily extract the goodness from the manufactured product. That’s why it looks like there’s “more” of some things in formula.
  • Cow’s milk is a very corn-intensive product….We’ve all read and heard about the challenges of feeding cows corn in Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma. Bad for cows. Industrial milk production. Then you’ve got to get the milk (cooled) to the processing plant. Energy to convert the milk to formula. Energy to make the packaging – and to get the formula into the packaging. And to get the formula to a warehouse. And then to a retailer. That’s a lot of fuel!
  • And what about safety! One of the hidden baddies? Powdered formula may be convenient and less expensive – but it’s not sterile. Cronobacter – which can make infants seriously ill – can be found in powdered formula. You can find more information about how to make formula safely at the CDC website http://www.cdc.gov/features/cronobacter/
  • You’ve got to put formula into a container with a top that’s safe for feeding your baby. I wish I had a dime for every bottle in the United States that’s sitting in somebody’s cabinet because they didn’t like it – I would be rich! We should just trade them all around at baby showers or something. (And don’t ever believe an ad campaign that says a particular nipple or bottle system is “most like mother” because there truly isn’t one.)
  • I’m not going to tell you to rely on breastfeeding for birth control….but Planned Parenthood will tell you

Less than 1 out of 100 women who practice continuous breastfeeding perfectly will become pregnant

About 2 out of 100 women who use continuous breastfeeding will become pregnant in the first six months if they don’t always practice it correctly.

If you plan to use this information in your own life you’d best go find out exactly what that means at              http://www.plannedparenthood.org/health-info/birth-control/breastfeeding.  Formula feeding moms are in a very different hormonal state. Their bodies think a new baby might be nice after six weeks or so.

Sometimes I think, “Well, what’s the big deal. This is America, we have the money and the water and the fuel, and this is the 21st century.” But you know what – it’s one world. Water is becoming more expensive (and scarce), fossil fuel is becoming more expensive (and won’t last forever), corn is getting more expensive – and breastfeeding is free! The extra calories mom needs to breastfeed? It’s the equivalent of one small bag of M&M’s.

How does breastfeeding help ensure environmental sustainability? Your body, your baby, good milk that you make yourself. Our babies love to be localvores!