For Research & Policy

The evidence, the policy and the people who act on both.

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Universities, institutes, government and industry bodies. Market and policy analysis with its sources shown, the technical questions the industry is asking, and the forums where research meets commercial decisions.

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What matters now

What changed in the market and the rules.

Market

Cheddar rises 9% in a month and still trails the milk price

What changed: Mild Cheddar gained £270 a tonne in September, more than any other product AHDB tracks, and cheese is back above butter and powder at the factory gate.
Why it matters: The October milk price rises were announced weeks before that figure was published, and AHDB says Cheddar prices remain too low to cover them.
What to watch: Whether November milk price announcements move again before the next AHDB wholesale assessment, and whether contract cheese prices follow the spot trades.

Members · Analysis · 29 September 2026

Regulation

The invoice arrives this autumn. Nobody can tell you what it says.

What changed: Year-two extended producer responsibility is priced on recyclability, and the confirmed fees are not published until November.
Why it matters: Packaging with missing recyclability data is rated red by default, so 100 tonnes rated red for want of an assessment costs £13,000 more than the same tonnage rated green.
What to watch: PackUK's confirmed year-two fees and the first Notice of Liability, both due by the end of November.

Members · Analysis · 22 September 2026

Technical

The Invisible Factory: the value leaving dairy through its drains

What changed: Every dairy measures the milk that arrives and the product that ships. Far fewer measure what leaves through the drains, the flue and the failures in between
Why it matters: The largest untapped margin on most dairy sites is not a new product but the value already leaving as effluent, heat and yield loss; the first commercial act is to measure it.

Members · Analysis · 20 August 2026

Intelligence

Markets, policy and regulation.

Independent pieces with sources listed. Filter by topic.

Members · Analysis · 10 min read

Cheddar rises 9% in a month and still trails the milk price

Mild Cheddar rose 9% in September, taking a litre made into Cheddar and whey to 39.08 pence and putting cheese back above butter and powder at the factory gate, but the October milk price rises were announced weeks before that figure was published, and AHDB says Cheddar prices remain too low to cover them.

29 September 2026

Members · Analysis · 7 min read

The invoice arrives this autumn. Nobody can tell you what it says.

The most expensive packaging decision available to a mid-sized processor this year is not a material decision at all: packaging with missing recyclability data is rated red, so 100 tonnes rated red by default rather than by design costs £13,000 more than the same tonnage rated green. That is larger than the gap between a realistic pack mix and a perfect one.

22 September 2026

Stainless steel pipework, valves, pumps and flow meters of a dairy processing skid

Members · Analysis · 4 min read

The Invisible Factory: the value leaving dairy through its drains

The largest untapped margin on most dairy sites is not a new product but the value already leaving as effluent, heat and yield loss; the first commercial act is to measure it.

20 August 2026

Close-up of a screen showing volatile red and green financial trend lines

Members · Analysis · 4 min read

2026 the volatility year

2026 will not be the recovery year the sector expected but the year that resets it, splitting shoppers into clearer tiers and leaving mainstream Cheddar the most exposed.

27 April 2026

An empty white plate with a knife and fork on a bright orange table

Members · Report · 15 min read

The Next Plate

The dairy majors have built their plans on protein while Mars has moved on to fibre, AI and the solo meal; none of them has yet made the meal for one, and especially the older one, a dairy occasion, and that is the opening for UK and Irish dairy.

28 October 2026

A group of older friends laughing together over their smartphones

Members · Report · 37 min read

The Longevity Economy

The opportunity is not a product labelled for older people but a portfolio redesigned around the nutritional, functional and experiential needs of longer lives, with value growth more plausible than broad volume growth.

19 October 2026

A small serving of natural yoghurt with granola and berries on a wide white plate

Members · Analysis · 6 min read

After protein: the smaller plate and dairy's fibre gap

Fibre is the first claim in this cycle that dairy cannot make from milk alone: only 4% of UK adults eat the recommended 30g a day, plain dairy carries no meaningful fibre, and dairy's own candidate, GOS, is neither a settled fibre claim in GB nor still made in Britain at scale, so a business that wants the claim in 2027 has to start the recipe and evidence work now.

13 October 2026

Members · Report · 17 min read

The Protein Plant

The finding that matters most for boards is about information, not plant: Britain publishes a value for whey sold as powder but none for whey fractionated into concentrates, isolates and specialised proteins, and a board cannot compare a route it cannot price.

7 October 2026

A supermarket chiller of cheese, yoghurts and protein yoghurts, with shelf price labels

Members · Report · 10 min read

The Unclaimed Protein

The Protein Series settled where the protein market is going; the decisions it leaves a dairy business are where to compete on the price ladder, which claim a formulation can legally carry, which of four positions to take, and how to tell whether it is working.

5 October 2026

Brief · 2 min read

The three numbers in your packaging budget are last year's

Year-two EPR resets the rate and starts charging on recyclability, so the number worth working out this month is not tonnage times rate but the red, amber and green split, and how much of the red is red only because an assessment was never submitted.

21 September 2026

Stainless steel balance tanks and pipework inside a dairy processing plant

Members · Analysis · 3 min read

Can a dairy become its own energy company?

Energy from waste is moving from a compliance cost to a resilience asset; the dairies that run digestion as a business line, not a bolt-on, hedge energy price and carbon at the same time.

19 August 2026

Curds separating from whey around steel cutting blades in a cheesemaking vat

Members · Analysis · 4 min read

Acid whey is not the problem. The business model is.

Acid whey is a business-model failure, not a technical one; the value is real but stranded until processors design for a saleable co-product rather than a disposal problem.

18 August 2026

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Expertise

Testing, certification and advisory specialists.

From the Dairy Connect Connect Directory, matched on expertise. Ordered by match, then by profile completeness, then alphabetically. Never by payment.

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Events

Is this worth your time?

Cork · 3 & 4 March 2027

Dairy Forum Ireland

Relevant to

Technical & Processing, Leadership & Strategy, Commercial & Sales, Artisan & SME

Why attend

How do we create more value from dairy? Twelve speakers follow milk from the farm to the market, each session closing on a chaired industry challenge. Opens with an evening of cheese and whiskey.

View programme Who’s it for?Get your free ticket

London · October 2027

Dairy Forum London

Relevant to

Leadership & Strategy, Commercial & Sales, Marketing & Brand, Retail & Foodservice

Why attend

One evening, one panel, five questions. The things the industry keeps arguing about, put to the people who decide them.

View programme Who’s it for?Register interest

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