For much of the 20th century, milk was a simple part of daily life in the U.S., as farmers

For much of the 20th century, milk was a simple part of daily life in the U.S., as farmers raised cows, milkmen delivered bottles and children drank it at school. But those days are fading. On January 5 Borden Dairy, the milk processor with a cheery Elsie the cow on its label, announced to be filing for bankruptcy (破产) protection. Borden Dairy, which said it was affected by “market challenges facing the milk industry,” follows Dean Foods, America’s largest milk producer, which filed for bankruptcy protection in November.
America has fallen out of love with drinking milk, as there are more lower-calorie options and people are preferring water bottles to milk cartons (盒子). Americans each drank about 146 lb. of fluid milk-a category that includes products from skim to creamin 2018, according to the USDA’s Economic Research Service. That may sound like a lot, but it’s down 26% just since 2000.
The downturn has been tough on milk processors like Borden and Dean, which buy fresh milk from farms and use techniques to create a consumer-safe drink with a longer shelf life. For the past five years, thanks to technology that increased milk production, fresh-milk prices were relatively low, which meant processors could break even although there was shifting demand. But prices went up again last year, squeezing the processors’ already tight profits. “Declining sales in a business with small profit is not a good recipe for success” says Mark Stephenson, director of dairy policy analysis at the University of Wisconsin.
Milk processors are also facing competition from big retailers (零售商) which have set up their own processing plants. In 2018, Walmart opened a milk-processing plant in Indiana to serve hundreds of stores in the Midwest, taking away approximately 95 million gal. of milk-processing business from Dean Foods.
8. What can we learn about American milk industry?
A. Consumers favor bottled milk.
B. Milk producers have cows on their labels.
C. Processed milk is losing its popularity.
D. Borden Dairy is the largest milk producer.
9. What does the underlined part “break even”，in paragraph 3 probably mean?
A. Have no loss. B. Upgrade technology.
C. Go bankrupt. D. Produce large quantities of goods.
10. What’s Mark Stephenson’s attitude towards the milk industry?
A. Positive. B. Concerned.
C. Ambiguous. D. Prejudiced.
11. Why have some big retailers brought a challenge to milk processors?
A. They open stores abroad. B. They lower the price of milk.
C. They process milk by themselves. D. They won’t offer fresh milk to processors.

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