Delivering on dairy levy investment

Last year, levy payers shared their views as part of our Shape the Future process to influence what priority areas the levy should be invested in. The clear message was that marketing, reputation and exports were the most important.

Since then, the Dairy Sector Council has ensured that those areas have been the focus of our delivery for the sector.

Over 90% of consumers who saw the We Eat Balanced campaign on social media featuring farmers felt that it increased credibility and belief that British red meat and dairy are produced sustainably.

The campaign has reached 43 million adults, with a number of consumers viewing dairy as a source of vitamin B12 rising significantly (+6%) compared to pre-campaign.

Last year, teachers downloaded 1.3m Food – a fact of life (FFL) resources to help them tell the farm-to-fork story in the classroom, totalling over 4m in the last three years.

Pupils have been taught important life skills such as cooking, utilising a range of online resources provided by AHDB and the British Nutrition Foundation.

• We are the independent source for genetic evaluations, breeding indices and analysis for all major dairy breeds
• Our genetics services provide evaluations of over one million cows each year and it is estimated that 95% of dairy semen sold in Great Britain now uses our independent genetic and genomics data
• Over a 20-year period, genetic improvement in the UK Dairy industry is estimated to have been between £2.2bn and £2.4bn
• We've supported levy payers to make better breeding decisions through an interactive workshop

We are currently supporting over 30 dairy exporters in a collaborative relationship with the Department for Business and Trade and Defra to promote the UK dairy brand in overseas markets.

We are presenting new, relevant opportunities so exporters can grow their customer bases all over the world.

''Over the past six years, we have worked closely with AHDB to help enhance and develop our exports of UK dairy products, mainly cheese, into markets across the globe. Through this working collaboration with AHDB, we have been successful in increasing our brand exposure in Asia, The Middle East and the Americas.

''Lucy has organised exhibitions/trade missions, trade events and embassy dinners in various countries as well as market insight into the regions, which has been invaluable in gaining distribution in these regions for our products. We will continue to work with AHDB on future trade missions.'' – John Morton, Wyke Farms