
Norwegian butter crisis (2011) - monort
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_butter_crisis
======
tallanvor
One of the things I hate most about living in Norway are the food prices and
selection. The government allows two main cooperatives: Tine - milk and dairy
products, and Nortua - meat products, to monopolize the market, and maintain
high tariffs that prevent foreign foods from offering price competition. This
allows farmers to maintain small, inefficient farms that produce rather
substandard products (Norwegian beef is about as tasteless as you can find).

For dairy, a smaller company Q started about 15 years ago and is probably
helping to keep milk prices down a bit since Tine actually has some
competition now, but not nearly enough to bring prices down to what you would
find across the border in Sweden, for example.

Unfortunately the grocery store situation doesn't help much either. The
largest company - NorgesGruppen - controls almost 40% of the grocery stores.
The bulk of the remainder are owned by two others. There is very little price
competition, and the selection is still very limited, although it is starting
to get a bit better (I've been living here almost 7 years now).

If you live close enough to Sweden, and have your own car (or have friends who
go frequently), you can save a ton of money on food and alcohol by heading
across the border and doing your shopping there. Unfortunately, it's about 1.5
hour drive from Oslo, so I don't have an opportunity to go very often. It's a
funny thing, Norwegian politicians tried to pass going over the border off as
a "low class" act, and there's even a derogatory term "harrytur" to describe
it, but it's still something that everyone does, regardless of income, simply
because the price difference is so great.

~~~
MindTwister
Things must be bad if you go to Sweden to buy cheap alcohol...

When visiting friends in Sweden they always ask us to bring beer (from
Denmark).

~~~
digi_owl
I recall seeing a photo of Finns either boarding or coming off the ferry
between Finland and Estland with trolleys stacked with cheap alcohol (just
enough per person to get under the tax quota most likely).

This was over at /r/europe i think, so eventually someone quipped that the
same alcohol would make its way to Sweden and Norway, with relevant markups
for each hop.

And i wonder if said tasty beef was restaurant served or home cooked...

~~~
semi-extrinsic
I know a few Norwegians who have cabins just across the border in Sweden, and
they will take an annual road trip to Estonia or Poland or wherever, fill up
the car with super-cheap alcohol and take it back to the cabin in Sweden, and
then bring the allowed (tiny) quota back to Norway every time they go to the
cabin.

------
hultner
As a swede I remember this, some entrepreneurial swedes smuggled truckloads of
butter over the border and sold through craigslist-esque resale markets for
massive profits (we're talking 10-50x the Swedish price). According to
Norwegian customs it's illegal to import diary products into Norway, thus
rendering the butter smuggling illegal but highly profitable.

Swedish newspapers wrote a lot of articles about this bizarre situation and
selling butter to Norwegians became a rather common joke in Sweden during this
time and the following year.

~~~
unwind
In some world views, going around legislation ("smuggling") for financial
profit makes you a criminal, not an entrepreneurial, person.

~~~
hultner
Who says that you can't be an entrepreneurial criminal? I wouldn't see them as
contradicting terms.

~~~
unwind
Nobody, it's just that especially around here "entrepreneurial" carries
positive connotations as far as I know, and I just wanted to point out that
all kinds of profit-making perhaps aren't equally awesome.

~~~
trhway
what is wrong with smuggling? Especially with the kind of smuggling mentioned
here? In that situation it was a very victimless crime and one can see how it
was even beneficial to the public.

~~~
lmz
Smugglers don't pay import tariffs. From the article:

> Shortages persisted as a result of high import tariffs on butter to protect
> the domestic dairy industry against foreign competition

~~~
bmmayer1
Import tariffs are the crime, then, not the smuggling.

------
ghshephard
Growing up in British Columbia in the 90s, it was a pretty common thing in
college to cross the border at Blaine (there was a Grocery Store right on the
other side of the border, and was one of the few American places that took
Canadian currency without blinking), and we always brought back lots of milk
and butter.

BC, of course, had fairly strict dairy quotas. So, in a province with abundant
farmland, Milk/Butter/Cheese were expensive enough that was worth a trip
across the border to stock up.

~~~
Aloha
The Chevron at truck crossing in Blaine still sells butter, huge amounts of
it. As an American, it floored me the first time I saw it.

------
angineering
It was actually really bad, as most Christmas cakes require a lot of butter.
It felt quite ridiculous that the shops were suddenly rationing butter to a
pack per customer in December. You would have thought it was war times. Some
friends abroad even gave me butter for Christmas, which was supposed to be a
joke but was actually really useful haha.

~~~
jimlei
Yeah I remember this, we just made our own butter. Shared a butter recipe on
my facebook wall - instant hero.

------
ekianjo
They should talk about the 2014-2015 butter crisis in Japan, where the butter
completely ran out from the shelves because of stupid local JA (Japan
Agriculture Mafia) restrictions imposed on imports and even inland, across-
region exchanges of butter. Pure market control madness at work, resulting in
people being unable to get their hands on butter for several months.

~~~
kuriho
I have been to Japan twice during this time and, as a tourist, didn't really
notice any of this. Is this why seemingly all the butter in Japans restaurants
is imported from Australia?

~~~
wodenokoto
The current butter crises is not as bad as the previous ones. While my local
grocery store regularly has a sign saying "butter sold out nationwide" the
7-11 down the street seems to have some and the bakery next door is using a
lot of butter in their products.

------
blinry
For many more "weird" articles, see
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Unusual_articles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Unusual_articles)

~~~
leni536
My favorite:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War)

~~~
xtrumanx
I'm not into computer graphics but the Utah teapot article [0] reminded me why
I carry the kettle back into the kitchen by the handle while spinning it
around to get a look at it at different angles.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_teapot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_teapot)

------
hkon
The most funny thing about this butter crisis, is that the producer actually
fucked up a batch of 60 tons of butter in August. Sure they were quick to
blame external factors, when the truth was that they fucked up.

[https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=no&tl=en&u=h...](https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=no&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bt.no%2Fnyheter%2Finnenriks%2FTine-
starter-leveranser-av-feilprodusert-smor-2636321.html)

~~~
philh
> The dairy industry estimated a deficit of 500 to 1000 tonnes

Sounds like 60 tonnes wouldn't have made much difference.

------
deciplex
Japan is currently in the middle of one of these due to a hot summer last
year. It is not as bad as the Norwegian one, however it is not the only one in
recent memory, either - there was a butter shortage in Japan in (IIRC) 2008 as
well.

~~~
w00kie
Frankly, it feels like we've had butter shortage for the past 5 years. It's
ridiculous...

------
ahvetm
Dear Norway. We stand ready to hook you up intravenously. You just say the
word.

Sincerely, Denmark. The Lurpak country.

~~~
kwhitefoot
I wouldn't eat Lurpak butter if you paid me. I agree that more competition
would be good but not at the expense of destroying the Norwegian policy on
agricultural self sufficiency.

Anyway Lurpak is from Arla which occupies the pretty much same sort of
position in Denmark as Tine in Norway.

The crisis was not really a great disaster and at the time there really were
not a lot of people calling for deregulation.

And as for the complaints about food being expensive, well to some extent this
is a national sport just like Brits complaining about the weather, that is,
not to be taken seriously. I'm English and have lived here in Norway for 30
years, almost half my life now so I well acquainted with both.

If food were too expensive it would be impossible to sell. Even the cheap
supermarkets here carry half a dozen brands of extra virgin olive oil for
example; and the variety of bread available here in even the smallest
supermarket outstrips most British hypermarkets, etc.

~~~
digi_owl
> The crisis was not really a great disaster and at the time there really were
> not a lot of people calling for deregulation.

Yep, it just fit the opposition party line of EU good, independence bad. And
the press jumped on it as a "look how shitty our nation is" story.

Never mind that the previous months had seen the very same press lauding a
high fat diet...

In the end it was pretty much a media created tempest in a teapot.

~~~
tormeh
I didn't follow the mainstream press at the time and didn't even notice it
happening. Had no butter problems at all. I only noticed it after the fact,
because relatives talked about it.

------
varsketiz
Colbert did a nice report on it - [http://videosift.com/video/Colbert-on-the-
Norwegian-Butter-S...](http://videosift.com/video/Colbert-on-the-Norwegian-
Butter-Shortage)

~~~
mynameishere
I haven't watched that in a long time. Was the laugh track always so obvious?

 _Sentence. Ha ha guffaw ha ha! Sentence. Ha ha guffaw ha ha! Sentence. Ha ha
guffaw ha ha! Sentence. Ha ha guffaw ha ha!_

It's like trying to watch the Mary Tyler Moore show:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihLJrcS8lsg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihLJrcS8lsg)

~~~
simongray
It's filmed with an audience (which Colbert regularly speaks directly to). I
don't think it's a laugh track.

~~~
digi_owl
I swear they have a "laugh" sign behind the camera that said "audience" has
been trained to follow.

~~~
tickit
That's just a typical US TV audience, the crowd freaks out at the slightest
thing. The people who make the shows are probably grateful for the padding,
but it's grating for viewers who aren't used to it.

~~~
digi_owl
Dunno if it is only US. I swear i have noticed this with British shows as
well.

------
lifeformed
Did the price of cream also skyrocket? Would it have been cheaper to make your
own butter?

~~~
MrBuddyCasino
Interesting question, don't know why this was downvoted. Making butter is
really easy using a stirrer.

~~~
icebraining
Since it was a milk shortage, I think it's reasonable to assume that cream was
also rarer, though I suppose it might not have been subject to the same import
restrictions.

------
finnjohnsen2
I'm pretty sure the phrase "butter crisis" was invented by the tabloids. I
would use "shortage", from how I experienced it -- but that doesn't produce
nearly as good "first world problems" satires I suppose.

~~~
digi_owl
It may be some 30 years old, but it still describes Norwegian media perfectly:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwegca0MhfQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwegca0MhfQ)

------
Angostura
Takes me back to the heady days of the 1970s UK sugar crisis

[http://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2010/jul/09/archive-r...](http://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2010/jul/09/archive-
rationing-sugar-shortage-looms)

It's when a lot of people stopped having sugar in their tea. Probably improved
UK health and dental health no end.

------
iwwr
When a government has to chose between a strong political constituency or the
people having access to food, be it a rich or poor society, the choice is
hard.

~~~
Arnt
I was in Norway twice during the crisis and my preferred brand was available
in the first shop I went to, both times. But my preferred brand is expensive
organic butter ("rørossmør", FWIW).

Maybe I just happened to visit the shop on the right two days. Or maybe the
crisis wasn't severe enough to make people buy the more expensive alternative.

~~~
digi_owl
Or some just didn't bother to insist on using butter.

First i heard of this "crisis" was when i walked past the TV...

------
ruiramos
Tommy did a nice report on this, from the trenches -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub0GzU56YMA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub0GzU56YMA)

------
bayesianhorse
Even though Norway is not part of the EU, it is quite dependent on it for all
sorts of reasons. This is an example where the Norwegian government tried to
stop that through high import tariffs on butter, and it backfired.

Because of its small population and northern location, it essentially has to
import much of its agricultural products from the EU, and thereby accept most
of the EU regulations and academic degrees without having the slightest say in
the matter.

------
andreash
Some people blamed it on the "Lavkarbo"-diet (low card, high fat) that was
trending in Norway at the time.
[https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=lavkarbo](https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=lavkarbo)

~~~
tracker1
They should just switch to Crisco, and other trans-fats like the U.S. ... I'm
joking really, as an American the concept of a butter shortage is interesting
considering most of this market uses heavily refined, flavored, perfumed
vegetable oils.

I switched to only using animal or cold-pressed fats a couple years ago...
It's helped some aspects of my health a lot... though I still crave starchy
carbs...

~~~
digi_owl
You're thinking about margarine?

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margarine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margarine)

Yeah, most "made do" with that. It was just a combo of diet fad, holiday
"traditions", and media looking for anything "controversial" to talk about...

------
venomsnake
Cows, grazing ... do they export some of it? The milk from grain fed animals
is bland.

~~~
thrownaway122
It is not uncommon in Europe for cows to feed mainly on grass. We don't have
the corn lobby (we have other ones instead).

~~~
wobbleblob
I don't know about the 'mainly' part. North of the Alps, the grass only grows
in the summer, south of the Alps, it only grows in spring and fall. If their
cows fed only or mainly on grass, dairy pastures could only support small
herds, and dairy would be a very expensive luxury item.

~~~
Dewie3
[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Hay_bales...](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Hay_bales_and_mountainside.jpg)

~~~
digi_owl
As one overly creative tourist guide supposedly put it, marshmallows for
trolls.

~~~
arstoienarston
We usually call them tractor eggs.

~~~
Dewie3
I've never heard that nickname before today.

------
tormeh
>As a result of the butter crisis, Norwegian retailers lost an estimated NOK
43m.

That's practically a rounding error. That's 21 suburban houses.

------
digi_owl
A stark reminder of how zombified the nation has gotten when a diet fad and a
holiday ritual is able to cause such a ruckus...

~~~
Dewie3
This was the same year that Utøya happened. You can't be in super-serious mode
all the time.

Based on this thread, you take the _labelling_ of this shortage much more
seriously than anyone ever took the shortage itself.

~~~
digi_owl
Because contextual jokes translates poorly online.

Lets not hand Fox News headlines on a platter...

------
PMan74
At the same time the EU (Norway stayed out of that party) was distributing its
surplus butter mountains to the poor.

~~~
globuous
I believe Jean-Baptiste Douemeng, a French communist, made millions exporting
subsidized surpluses, including butter, to communist countries in the 40s-50s:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-
Baptiste_Doumeng](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Baptiste_Doumeng)

~~~
mellavora
So was he an "enterprising communist", "entrepreneurial communist", or
"criminal communist"?

------
fiatjaf
I'm searching for a video of The Daily Show about this butter crisis. Who
knows where is it?

