Daniel Münster takes us to the troubled history of improving dairy production in India, from the crossbreeding and high-cost industrialized care of delicate hybrids to the equally complex implications of a native-cow revival. The apparent success story of improving dairy cows is tainted by past violence involved in eradicating indigenous breeds. This story has recently been challenged by politically engaged “Natural Farmers” who, while rejecting all nonnative species, have rediscovered old native breeds and their symbionts, promoting these as the only true and beneficial multispecies assemblages for the local ecosystems.
DOI: doi.org/10.5282/rcc/7771