Dairy exports

Dairy has seen the sharpest fall in exports of any category in 2009, down 6.9% to £776.9m, with cheese virtually static at just +0.5% to £282.6m (a poor performance compared to the stellar growth of recent years), milk and cream (not concentrated/sweetened) down 2.4% to £194.7m, milk and cream (concentrated/sweetened) down 33.0% to £110.4m, and whey down 17.5% to £27.6m.

  • Within cheese, cheddar was up 4.2% to £100.7m (no.1 market Ireland +7.3%, no.4 France +21.4%, but no.2 Netherlands -18.8% and no.3 USA -5.8%).
  • Territorial cheeses were up 3.8% but the no.1 market, the USA (which has seen its share of this category drop from 70% in 2008 to 55% in 2009), was down 19.2%. High growth from small bases was seen in the Netherlands, Ireland, Germany and Australia.
  • Blue cheese was down 17.1% (no.1 market USA -24.8%).
  • Processed cheese exports were also well down, -7.4%.

Dairy products exports 2008-2009 (£ Million)

Source: Leatherhead Food International

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More information

Download the full UK Food and Drink Performance (2009) statistics research report - pdf | 228kb.

Research carried out by Leatherhead Food Research for the Food and Drink Federation (April 2010)


Last reviewed: 16 Apr 2010