Bovaer is successfully promoted and applied in many countries. The substance can reduce methane emissions from cows by up to 27 percent and is therefore seen as a tool in the green transformation of agriculture.
Recently, conspiracy theories have spread on UK social media claiming that American billionaire and Microsoft founder Bill Gates is 'behind it'. He has previously been targeted by conspiracy theorists for allegedly buying up agricultural land worldwide to control the food supply.
Although the additive has been approved by authorities, and several experts according to the BBC estimate that there are no health risks, conspiracy theories continue to spread on social media.
Public confusion is further fueled because several organic dairy producers say they do not feed Bovaer to their cows, leaving the impression 'that there is apparently something wrong with it.' In those cases, organic livestock farming does not clarify that they add nothing to the feed due to their 'organic' certification.
"Our milk and meat production is based on traditional, organic pastures and non-intensive farming methods. Nature knows what it’s doing," writes the British dairy company Hook & Son on X. In response, DSM-Firmenich stated that the trial in the UK "has caused falsehoods and misinformation" about the product's safety.
Arla has also responded to the controversy in the UK. "The criticism on social media is based on a completely false premise that Bill Gates is behind Bovaer and that it is unsafe for people to drink milk from cows fed Bovaer," says Arla director Rune Jungberg Pedersen. "Both claims are categorically untrue, and it is crucial for us that consumers are not misinformed."