‘Don’t be afraid of the milk – let’s look at it as an opportunity.’ Peter Giørtz-Carlsen sends out call to action to dairy industry

Peter Giørtz-Carlsen, Executive Vice President, Arla Foods UK, has sent out a call to action to the dairy industry as part of his presentation to the European Dairy Association Annual Congress 2015 in Edinburgh.

With over 200 representatives attending the conference, Peter participated in the Friday session where he was joined by other dairy leaders from Müller, Meggle AG,Glanbia and Graham's Dairies to share their expertise on the next steps, challenges and opportunities for the European dairy industry in a post-quota world.

The theme of Peter’s presentation was ‘don’t be afraid of the milk – let’s look at it as an opportunity.’ Peter outlined his belief that emerging markets play a vital role in this opportunity and the need to conquer these new markets.

The speech outlined what the industry and governments needed to do to ensure success in opening up the right markets and making the relevant investments:

• Create competitive conditions for farmers in the countries where they farm. Dairy sustainability and programmes such as Arlagården will help farmers run their farms as efficiently as possible, while doing this responsibly.
• Ensure access to emerging markets within competitive conditions to we can take our high quality milk produced by our owners across Europe and innovate and export these products to markets where there is an increasing demand for dairy.
• Invest in health. We have shown how this is a key driver for our future in all markets.
• Act with pace when it comes to society’s issues with obesity and under nutrition as well as government and NGO agendas.
• Continually innovate through R&D and get these products to market and this is a continual cycle
• Make sure that milk will continue to be recognised for its healthy properties and continue to have a healthy role in a balanced diet
• Recognise that sustainable diets and eating will play a greater role in the future.

Peter finished with why he believes Arla being farmer-owned and governed by farmers while retaining a commercial edge and focus is important: “Farmers care and are proud of their cows and their milk whilst caring for the environment and their local communities. Farmers are passionate about what happens to their milk and constantly push us to maximise their returns. They provide us with a great raw material and the opportunity to grow our business.”

Arla Foods is a global dairy company and co-operative owned by dairy farmers circa 3,000 of whom are British.

Dating back to 1881, Arla’s purpose is to secure the highest value for its farmers’ milk, while creating opportunities for their growth. With production facilities in 11 countries and sales offices in a further 30, Arla is the world’s sixth largest dairy company and largest supplier of organic dairy products. Arla has a total of more than 18,000 colleagues and its products are sold under the well-known brands Arla®, Lurpak® and Castello® in more than 100 countries.

Arla Foods UK is the largest dairy company in the country and is home to leading dairy brands Anchor, Cravendale, and Lactofree. It has a turnover of £2.3 billion. As well as being number one in fresh liquid milk, butter, spreads and cream, Arla is the UK’s largest cheese manufacturer. It has also built the world’s largest fresh milk facility located at Aylesbury and has plans for it to be the first zero carbon site of its kind. The UK business has a team of approximately 3,500 colleagues located at its dairies, distribution centres and head office.