Which costs more to produce? Soy milk or cow's milk?

Question

I know soy milk COSTS more in the stores (because of demand), but what about to produce? Which also includes more production?

Assume the demand for milk and soy milk were the same, than which would cost more to produce?

Citing any sources would be helpful as well. Thanks.

This question came up at work when discussing veganism. I don't think either of us knew for sure what we were backing up, so I'm trying to find info myself right now, but any advances are appreciated.

Answer 1

It's a lot cheaper to make soy milk.

You can make it yourself with an investment of about $100. It ends up costing about $.25 per gallon.

Making your own cow's milk would cost a lot more.

Dairy is subsidized, soy milk is not.

Answer 2

Oh, soy milk of course. See, vegetable farmers receive no subsidization for their business, but mean and dairy companies do. That is why a pound of low grade beef is dirt cheap -- otherwise is would likely cost around $50 a pound, no joke. It's very expensive and every tax paying citizen is helping to contribute to lowering the costs of meat and dairy. Why do they receive subsidization? because it's an unsustainable business otherwise. You can't make money at such a business, you put so much water and so much food into an animal, but get very little in return. This also contributes to cutting corners in order for the animal farm to lower costs more and try to survive since subsidization often is not enough to help. Just imagine how cheap vegetable would be if subsidization was given to vegetable farms... it would be pennies instead of dollars. Also, most of the world's soy beans are grown for animals to eat. The USA alone could feed the entire world very easily with the food that is fed to animals.

Answer 3

Converting grass, corn and feed into cows milk uses tons more energy and resources. The only reason dairy is cheaper than soy is farm subsities for cattle food and dairy production as well as water subsities. Think about how much soymilk you could get out of an acre of land growing soybeans and if you could get a pregnant cow fed on that same piece of land.
To get 1 pound of edible wheat you need 25 gallons of water To get 1 pound of edible beef you need 5,214 gallons of water
That's not a typo, that's five thousand. This is from the California Agriculture Extention. You will have to make the leap from wheat and beef to Soy and cows milk.

Answer 4

i have a soy milk maker it cost 100
before the soy maker, i make it by hand, by boiling water and throw in soy beans in a cloth bag and boil for 20 mins and i sqeeze the bag when i'm done

with the machine it cost 30 cent per gallon
not couting electricty, it only takes 15 min with the machine
the machine takes 30 minutes to clean up.

so i think soy is cheaper to produce, because i'm just a guy and i can make it for 30cent, a factory can problly make a gallon for 3 cents, and sell it for $6 a gallon

i don't have source, i just make stuff up as i go along

Answer 5

Soymilk is more expensive at stores. Most vegetarian food is- because the general population of people are not vegetarian.
If the demand were the same, probably regular milk would cost the same. Cows require a lot of grain and water everyday- and the cost for raising one single cow for milk would far outweigh the cost of raising soybeans for making soymilk.

Answer 6

See table 6 which shows you that soybeans are pretty much the most grown item so the raw material cost would be cheap, but of course few people buy soy milk in the US
http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/EIB14/eib14d.pdf

However, most indications are that it is easy to make and people who make it themselves find it is a lot cheaper, for example this information:
http://www.ellenskitchen.com/faqs/tofumilk.html

So if it were produced in larger volumes it would likely be less. I believe in the Asian market the soymilk sold there (normally unsweeted) is less expensive.

Answer 7

I think that soy milk

Answer 8

I live in parched and dry Pahrump, Nevada. Our scarce water is used to water about 500 acres of alfalfa for a dairy. As a physician I have studied and found that in most cases soy milk is healthier. The soy beans are grown in Alabama using no Nevada water. Each substitution of a gallon of soy milk for cow's milk saves over a 1,000 gallons of water. Removing a cow from an area is the same as stopping the use of one polluting automobile. I could write for hours there is so much insanity to put dairies in the desert.

Answer 9

probably soy milk

Answer 10

i think that soy would be healthier, but cow milk is less money.