FANCY a splash of camel milk in your morning coffee?
For thousands of years ancient cultures in the Middle East, including desert nomads, have been drinking the nutrient-packed superfood for its health benefits.
But despite this - and the fact WA has the largest feral camel herd in the world - the animal has been a somewhat ignored and wasted natural resource.
That was until cameleer Stephen Geppert found a way to capitalise on - instead of cull - the declared pest.
Mr Geppert, with the support of agricultural industry trailblazer Henry Steingiesser, Mr Steingiesser's son Marcel and late former WA Agricultural Minister Kim Chance, founded Good Earth Dairy in 2016.
Today, the dairy sits on 800 hectares of land at Dandaragan and runs 100 head of camel, with each camel producing five litres of milk on average per day.
Dubbed 'white gold' and a 'magical elixir of health' the demand and popularity of camel milk has continued to rise among health-conscious consumers.
Good Earth Dairy chief executive officer Marcel Steigniesser said as consumers 'get over the hump' (pardon the pun), the dairy alternative would become a major staple on an international platform.
"Camel milk is packed with micro-nutritional benefits and supports good gut health," Mr Steingiesser said.
"It is the only milk outside of our mother's milk that does not constitute the allergen in whey protein.
"Australia has a reputation of being the food bowl for the world and this (Good Earth Dairy) complements that fact."
The first camels in WA were either lost or stolen from early exporters in the mid 1800s.
An additional release of domestic camels into the wild occurred in the 1920s and '30s when motorised transport became common.
A culling program, funded by the Federal government in 2009, has helped curb camel populations.
Ironically, it was during a 12-month trek across the Australian desert with two camels in 2010, that Mr Geppert came up with the idea to harness camels for milk.
"We want to work with pastoralists who are having problems with camels," Mr Steingiesser said.
"We want to give them an alternative choice to culling them.
"Hopefully, as the industry takes off, there will be better value in camels than hiring people to shoot them."
Good Earth Dairy was established five years ago, but the proof of concept started back in 2012.
Mr Steingiesser, who was working as a chemical engineer with BHP for 14 years, became involved when his father Henry asked him to review the concept.
"I worked on a thorough lit review on the product differentiation of camel milk and looking at the potential for it to be a global commodity," Mr Steingiesser said.
"My father and I put together the information and started obtaining some investment into the business.
"Then on Melbourne Cup day of 2015, we decided to put the shovel in the ground and that was the birth of Good Earth Dairy."
Never in his wildest dreams did Mr Steingiesser think he would leave the mining industry to focus on the dairy full-time.
But he decided to take a risk and he has no regrets.
"I never intended to move into this and only joined the company initially to help my old man out and get the first pilot plant dairy off the ground," Mr Steingiesser said.
"I decided to make the move to do this full-time on a much longer-term basis based on the significant opportunity to turn this into a global company.
"My role at BHP was to help commoditise both nickel and alumina, by looking at how to reduce costs and increase volume in those operations," Mr Steingiesser said.
"I'm using these skills with Good Earth Dairy.
"Historically, there has been very little research done on camel milk and we have been refining and improving the level of knowledge for over five years."
Mr Steingiesser said Good Earth Dairy was looking at a sustainable approach to utilise camels, particularly given that significant community drinking dairy alternatives - including soy, oat, almond and rice milk - were not actually vegan.
Instead consumers were choosing milk alternatives because they were lactose intolerant or intolerant to the whey protein found in cow's milk.
"Most people are very informed about lactose and lactose-intolerance," he said.
"But a much greater and common intolerance people aren't aware of is the allergen in milk from the whey protein.
"You can have lactose free milk, but still be allergic to the whey protein that is in that milk, so you can't drink it.
"That is why a lot of people still can't tolerate the dairy in the lactose free milk option."
Mr Steingiesser added that as well as not having the allergen in whey protein, camel milk also had less casein protein.
He said that arguably made the camel milk more digestible, as it is the casein protein that coagulates (solidifies) in the gut pre-digestion.
"That is more specific for young children and infants because when we are born our mother's milk is 99pc whey with very little casein."
Mr Steingiesser said in terms of micronutrients, camels were better filters from the food they consumed to the nutrition that ended up in the milk.
"Camels take the nutrition from the food and convert it into their milk at a higher efficiency and, as a result, you have higher micronutrients," he said.
"Camel milk is a lot higher than anything else in nutrients like copper and zinc, which are required for our immune system, Iodine for brain development and magnesium for muscular systems.
"Most people know about calcium for the skeletal system, but not many are aware about the phosphorus component for their skeletal system.
"Camel milk has both of those."
When it comes to taste, Mr Steingiesser said camel milk and cow milk tasted much the same.
He said while most people wouldn't be able to tell the two apart in cereal, camel milk would not make for a great additive in coffee because it had a slightly saltier taste.
"In relation to our new products being launched in the next financial year (FY22), the market research we have done into our new products showed that no one could single out the camel milk.
"Ninety five per cent of people assumed it was cow's and the rest thought it was a non-dairy alternative.
"So from a flavour perspective I think it could be made to taste exactly the same as cow milk."
Good Earth Dairy's camel milk will set you back anywhere between $13-20 a litre and is available in gourmet grocers and IGA supermarkets across WA.
Mr Steingesser said one of the company's long-term goals was to make it almost as cheap as cow's milk.
He added it was more expensive due to the smaller herd and litres of milk produced each day.
"I'm sure our future herd will all be 25 litre a day milkers.
"This month, we purchased 48 new animals, plus we have also ordered a further 70, which are due to arrive.
"Of the 100 camels we currently have, about 60 are pregnant.
"We expect to have another 150-170 animals in the next six months."
Camels are milked similarly to cows - the difference is the calves are not weaned and the milk is shared.
Currently, the dairy is run by one person, who bottles and pasteurises the milk and the requirement for workers will grow as the business grows.
About 300 litres of milk are produced a week, but this is expected to increase to 1200-1500 litres in the next six months with the introduction of more animals.
Camels are fed hay, mineral stocks and pellets with the aim of improving conditions, quality and yield.
Traditionally, similar to other large animals, camels have certain nutritional requirements including levels of protein, fat, fibre and micronutrients.
Good Earth Dairy has also commenced the construction of an export licence facility that will produce a lot of newer products that are currently in the pipeline.
"We are hoping to launch these products both nationally and internationally in about six months time," Mr Steingiesser said.
"At the same time, we have commenced another campaign with Birchal and are looking to raise up to three million dollars for the next phase of growth, which is a 5000-head dairy.
"We are looking for expressions of interest to support this via the Birchal website."
Their first crowdfund, which launched on Birchal in October 2020, broke an Australian record at the time and raised $1.2 million in less than four days.
This will allow Good Earth Dairy to fund the initial construction and approvals of their niche 5000-head dairy and enable acceleration of the dairy's growth.
So what's the end goal?
Good Earth Dairy want to be a major global infant formula producer using camel milk.
Over the next five years they are also looking to build 10 modular dairies, which will each hold 5000-head of camel.
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
www.goodearthdairy.com.au
