2023 IDF Dairy Innovation Awards Finalists Announced

The International Dairy Federation (IDF) is thrilled to announce the finalists for the 2023 edition of the IDF Dairy Innovation Awards that have been published today after a careful assessment by a prestigious jury of global dairy experts. The winners will be revealed on October 16 during the IDF World Dairy Summit in Chicago, USA.

The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards aim to showcase the dairy industry’s engagement and dynamism on a global scale, providing a unique platform to highlight innovative processes, practices, and products that not only enhance efficiency but also contribute to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

In its second edition, the IDF Dairy Innovation Awards 2023 received an impressive 173 entries from 26 countries. This marks a remarkable 20% increase compared to the number of entries received in last year’s edition. The significant rise in submissions highlights the growing enthusiasm and participation of the dairy industry worldwide. With such a diverse and extensive pool of entries, the anticipation for the winners’ announcement at the IDF World Dairy Summit is undoubtedly at an all-time high.

Entries per categories

“Innovation has always been instrumental in keeping milk and dairy products an essential part of sustainable and nutritious diets throughout history. The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards 2023 have showcased the industry’s extraordinary capacity for groundbreaking innovations and the seamless incorporation of new technologies”, said IDF Director General, Caroline Emond.

The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards are organized by the International Dairy Federation in partnership with the world-renowned food and drinks consultancy, Zenith Global, and are proudly headline-sponsored by Tetra Pak. Together, they are committed to recognizing and promoting innovation within the dairy sector, driving positive change for the industry and its impact on global food systems.

FINALISTS

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Environment

• Bioret Agri (France) – Aquaclim Thermodynamic: the first climatised waterbed to fight heat stress for dairy cows, while harvesting the animal’s body energy.
• Dairy Australia (Australia) – Farm Environmental Tracker: the Farm Environmental Tracker allows farmers to assess their farm’s performance and identify improvement opportunities that are interconnected with natural capital asset management and natural resources.
• Lactanet Canada and Semex Alliance (Canada) – Methane Efficiency Evaluations: the world’s first official genetic evaluation to decrease methane emissions in dairy cattle. The genomic evaluation for Methane Efficiency allows producers to select for decreased methane production without impacting milk production.

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Animal Care

• FaunaTech (India)– FaunaTech: a novel smartphone-based handheld diagnostics platform for early detection of critical diseases, monitoring cattle health and screening milk quality at the farm level and reducing antibiotic usage.
• Maahi Milk Producer Company Limited (India) – Maahi Milk Producer Company Limited (India): a digital platform to interact and avail cost effective doorstep veterinary services for their animals including visit registration, maintaining diagnostic & treatment history of animals & case papers.
• Mileutis (Israel) – Imilac: a disruptive, residue-free, intramammary, Non-GMO, Non-Antibiotic Offering for Dry Cow Therapy, delivering a full solution package for dairy farmers for management of Mastitis at dry-off and Milk Enhancement & Shortening the Dry Period.

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Socio-Economic

• Dairibord Zimbabwe (Zimbabwe) – Dairibord Cascase Baobab Dairy Fruit Juice: The innovation is in the idea of combining dairy and baobab, the formulation of a product which is perfectly balanced and appeals to a wider section of the market, and on the method of delivering natural fortification to consumers.
• Danone (France) – Transforming the Food System by Empowering Algerian Smallholder Farmers: The H’lib Dzair Project supports rural development in Algeria, improves the livelihoods of smallholder farmers, strengthened local dairy value chains, and reduced farms’ ecological footprints, making the Algerian dairy sector more resilient and enabling Algeria to be less dependent on imported milk.
• S. Dairy Export Council (US) – Hillcrest: Hillcrest worked with researchers to
• quantify the farm’s greenhouse gas (GHG) footprint and identify practices to further reduce GHG emissions. Research conclusions tell an impressive story of a farm that can be sustained long into the future, and it is a blueprint for other farms around the region and the country.

Innovation in Sustainable Processing

• EnviroChemie GmbH (Germany) – EnviroChemie GmbH: by converting organic waste (solid or liquid) into biogas, energy is obtained. This reduces the costs of electricity. The disposal costs are also reduced considerably. The treatment prevents the entry of oxygen-consuming substances into the environment and thus protects against eutrophication.
• Hochschule Hanover (Germany) – Development of a RO-NF-UF membrane cascade to concentrate skim milk to a dry matter of > 48%: this innovative approach resulted in the highest concentration factor of milk that was ever achieved without the use of evaporation.
• S. Dairy Export Council (US) – Milk Specialities Global: MSG’s sustainability strategy includes a transportation efficiency goal to push transportation miles and related greenhouse gas emissions down to the lowest possible level.

Innovation in Sustainable Packaging

• Mengniu Dairy Company Limited (China) – Carbon reduction and environmental protection packaging demonstration: Youyi C bottle label free packaging: Mengniu’s innovative design for bottle free packaging follows the 5R principle of redesign, reduce, reuse, cycle, and recovery.
• Société des Produits Nestlé S.A – Société des Produits Nestlé S.A (Switzerland): the stainless-steel packaging solution significantly reduces material consumption compared to traditional single-use By utilizing durable stainless-steel cups, we eliminate the need for disposable materials like plastic, leading to significant resource savings and waste reduction.
• Yili Group Ltd (China) – Declaring Your Love to the Earth with Actions – SATINE Environmentally Sustainable Packaging with No Ink or Printing: this packaging contributes to environmental protection in multiple ways, such as the use of recycled milk cartons that are transformed into corrugated paper for the outer box, thereby realizing the concept of true self-circulation

Innovation in New Product Development with Focus on Food Safety and Consumer Nutrition

• Beijing Sanyuan Foods Co. Ltd (China) – Beijing Sanyuan Foods Co. Ltd: given the current global concerns about food safety risks, including contamination by hazardous substances and residues, we have established a dairy safety assurance technical system that includes measures for source control, processing supervision, and rapid confirmation.
• Everest Instruments Pvt. Ltd (India) – FatScan Milk Analyser: the FatScan milk analyser is a powerful tool that can be used to accurately measure the key parameters of milk samples, including fat, non-fat, and added water. The FatScan milk analyser is also a powerful tool that can be used to improve the quality, safety, and affordability of milk.
• Unison Process Solutions (Ireland) – Heist System: the HEIST system is the world’s first automatic testing system for plate and tubular heat exchangers.
• Yili Group Ltd (China) – Ambient Cheese Lollipop: this product utilizes natural bioactive antibacterial ingredients and scientifically combines them with preservatives to extend the product shelf life and ensure its safety during storage. It uses dual technologies to guarantee the quality, safety, and nutrition of the ambient cheese lollipop production process.
• Yili Group Ltd (China) – High calcium cheese bomb is a low-temperature refrigerated cheese product suitable for children. By investigating the characteristics of children’s favourite cartoon characters, the shape of Disney princesses and cute dinosaurs is reflected in the shape of the product, to meet the candid fun of young consumers, one bite at a time. In terms of nutrition, the nutritional development of cheese products is carried out in response to the characteristics of children’s rapid growth and development,and the need to balance protein, fat, carbohydrates, and other nutritional elements.

Innovation in Women Empowerment in the Dairy Sector

• Asha Mahila Milk Producer Company Limited (India) – Asha Mahila Milk Producer Company Limited: Asha is a completely women-owned organization which has been able to break centuries old shackles of discrimination and oppression of these rural women by providing an assured market for the milk they pour and adopting of transparent and regular payment mechanism through digital means. Approximately 85% of the revenue is paid back to the women dairy farmer members, who are our owners.
• Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd (India) – A unique model of Women Empowerment through Education and Skill Development: To empower women socially and economically in a strategic way at different levels in the dairying, member unions of GCMMF have planned, designed, and implemented various programmes for awareness, education, developing leadership qualities and managerial skill among women milk producers.
• Shreeja Milk (India) – Shreeja Milk: Shreeja, with its impressive membership of 120,000 women, boasts the world’s largest women base in the dairy industry. Shreeja has implemented several initiatives and programs aimed at enhancing female leadership and empowering women within the dairy sector.
• Yili Group (China) – Empowering female quality managers and showcasing female leadership in the dairy industry: The project empowers female quality managers through a lot of measures, enhances women’s professional and management capabilities, and opens up to female technical talents and management talents.

Innovation in Climate Action

• Amul Dairy (India) – Amul Dairy: the innovation of Amul Dairy speaks about its innovative flexi biogas model developed as a stout step towards energy security, fundamentally important not only for India’s economic growth but also for sustainable livelihood, health hazard of the family members, unemployment and climatic change.
• Lactanet and Semex (Canada) – Lactanet and Semex: In April 2023, Lactanet Canada launched the world’s first official genetic evaluation to decrease methane emissions in dairy cattle. This was achieved through years of research and development during which methane emissions and routine milk tests were recorded on dairy cows in Canadian research herds.
• National Dairy Development Board (India) – Dung based circular economy for sustainable dairy production.

Innovation in Marketing & Communication Initiative Building Dairy Category

• AHDB (UK) – AHDB: Its objective was to positively influence consumer attitudes to British Dairy over time, specifically attitudes to its high nutritional value, including B12 and sustainability This strategy seeks to join up these dots, whilst putting British dairy at the core. The We Eat Balanced campaign was launched to cut through the negative noise – with a particular focus on the nutritional benefit of consuming British dairy versus the relative impact of producing it. We used our insight (including an impact assessment) to drive our thinking, which helped to shape the campaign around the key messages of
• 1) Health – specifically the range of minerals dairy provides (the hero being vitamin B12, which scored top box in our impact test)
• 2) Environment – specifically that dairy produced in the UK is one of the most sustainable in the World.
• CNIEL (France) – CNIEL: a recent marketing campaign promoting sustainable dairy is a story told in manga style. Manga, a comic graphic style originating in Japan, is greatly appreciated by young people in France, becoming an increasingly major segment of book purchases: 1 out of 4 books sold in France are manga.
• Dairy Farmers of Canada (Canada) – Daisy: DFC developed Daisy (@moo_daisy), the world’s first digital cow influencer, to counter misinformation on TikTok by sharing facts about Canadian dairy farming.
• Dairy Farmers of Canada (Canada) – We’re In: the campaign, called “I’m in,” told Canadian consumers about DFC’s Net Zero by 2050 commitment through a creative storytelling method that reflected the personal commitment of individual dairy farmers.