IDF Dairy Innovation Awards 2022 Delivered

The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards have been handed out today. The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards 2022 have been announced at a ceremony that took place at the IDF World Dairy Summit in New Delhi, India. Those awardees present at the event received their awards in person and gave acceptance words to an audience of dairy experts and leaders. Those awardees who were not able to attend in person sent videos of acceptance that were showcased during the ceremony.

Mr Mayank Trivedi, Senior Vice-President & Head of Strategic Business Unit Dairy, Nestle, keynote speaker of the event, delivered some inspiring words to all the winners, finalists, and attendees. Also, Mr Ashutosh Manohar, South Asia Managing Director of Tetra Pak, pronounced a short speech while handing out the Innovation on Climate Action award.

The IDF Dairy Innovation Awards is an International Dairy Federation initiative designed to celebrate and encourage innovative practices across the global dairy sector, which was launched on February 17 in partnership with Zenith Global and supported by headline sponsorship from Tetra Pak.

With a particular focus on Sustainability, both in terms of environmental care and positive social impact, the awards seek to stimulate innovative practices that improve the farming and processing of milk and dairy foods.

“Innovation is part of IDF’s DNA from its foundation back in 1903”, explains Piercristiano Brazzale, president of IDF. “Our mission is to foster the use of science, technology and innovation to ensure the production and processing of milk and dairy products in safe, nutritious and sustainable ways”, he adds. “We believe that this award will help innovative practices to be known and shared among relevant dairy actors at a global level”, Mr Brazzale states.

In its inaugural edition, the IDF Dairy Innovation Awards received 144 entries with participation from every continent worldwide, which shows that the Dairy Sector’s commitment to innovation and sustainability has no boundaries and may be found in every link of the milk and dairying production chain.

THE WINNERS

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Environment

• National Dairy Development Board, India - Manure Value Chain Model, India, a system of small familiar biogas to obtain organic fertilizer and gas for cooking has an extraordinary socio-economic value for Indian communities. An innovative effort to bring existing technology in the smallholder context to scale by creating a business model that rewards the value of manure for small holder farmers. This is all the more important as low-yielding smallholder farms have a strong environmental impact. Improvements and innovations in this area, create a large impact if taken to scale. A really great example of the circular economy at the smallholder scale. The high score is due to its focus on smallholders who are the majority of dairy farms in India and worldwide.

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Animal Care

• Dairycs - Dairycs Meadow-Sense, Israel, a smart, innovative technology that is extremely useful in helping the farmer to stay on top of the health and welfare of their livestock, and be able to take action earlier, plus ensure that each animal is getting the care and attention that they need.
• National Dairy Development Board, India - e-GOPALA, India, an extraordinary innovation that allows the farmer to be in control.

Innovation in Sustainable Farming Practices – Socio-Economic

• Mooofarm Private Limited - Mooofarm App, India, an app that gives the possibility to stay in touch with veterinaries, is a great example of the application of digital farming. It is unique in its use of facial recognition for identification and gamified incentives.

Innovation in Sustainable Processing

• Brazzale SpA - Fully automated maturing warehouse 4.0, Italy, Brazzale SpA’s next-generation cheese ripening facility matches new technology with green energy generation, a model for other cheesemakers around the world.

Innovation in Research & Development – Farming

• Dairycs - Dairycs Meadow-Sense, Israel. Automatic and digital farming is the future of zootechnic and agriculture to increase efficiency and productivity, finally, reduce the environmental impact and obtain and ensure animal health and care.
• National Dairy Development Board, India - Establishing system of Genomic Selection for buffaloes in India, India. The use of genomics to improve the selection of buffalo has a socio-economic high value. Genomic selection will allow for improved individual productivity thereby decreasing GHG intensity of production and increasing value back to the dairy farmer.

Innovation in Research & Development – Collection & Processing

• National Dairy Development Board, India - NDERP (NDDB Dairy ERP), India, an open source-based ERP integrated with AMCS (Automatic Milk Collection System) software, India, a system that guarantees control of the milk delivered by the farmers, with important socio-economic consequences. NDERP provides transparency in milk collection and food safety analysis for payments to small shareholder dairy farmers.

Innovation in Research & Development – New Product Development

• Yili Group - Yili Drinkable Cheese, China. Yili Drinkable Cheese is a new product in the cheese category making it a drinkable product. During the development of the cheese market for children in China. This is an innovative product that could open a new system of consumption of cheese.

Innovation in Research & Development – Food Safety

• Yili Group - Construction and Application of the "Food Safety Risk Analysis Model" in Dairy Enterprises, China, a fully integrated system of control to guarantee food safety.

Innovation in Research & Development – Consumer Nutrition

• Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd (Amul) - Amul Protein Buttermilk & Amul Protein Lassi, India, a high-quality product for infant fortified, based on the latest data of nutrition survey.
• Société des Produits Nestlé SA; Nestlé Product Technology Centre Dairy - Unlocking iron fortification in dairy to address micronutrient deficiency, Switzerland, a great innovation that provides for iron fortification to address iron deficiency, achieving bioavailability of iron through fortification without negative effects and, therefore, a commendable breakthrough.

Innovation in Sustainable Packaging

• Wipak UK Ltd - Recyclable Butter Wrap, United Kingdom. Replacing aluminium and polyethylene with an FSC-certified is a very innovative packaging system. It accurately identifies the UN Sustainability Goals and achieves via use of this packaging material.

Innovation in School Milk Programmes

• Karnataka Co-operative Milk Producers' - Federation Karnataka Cooperative Milk Producers' Federation Ltd, India. This project is addressing with success the hard realities of that state. It’s a clearly beneficial program to industry, as well as the children, reaching large numbers of beneficiaries, with substantial potential for economic growth for small holder producers.

Innovation in Climate Action

• China Shengmu Organic Milk Limited - Quality Milk in the Desert, China, for its holistic approach to climate action, targeting some of the most impactful ways to make dairy more sustainable, including reducing enteric emissions, improving biodiversity and carbon sequestration via reforestation.

About IDF (International Dairy Federation)
Helping nourish the world with safe and sustainable dairy
The IDF is the leading source of scientific and technical expertise for all stakeholders of the dairy chain. Since 1903, IDF has provided a mechanism for the dairy sector to reach a global consensus on how to help feed the world with safe and sustainable dairy products. A recognized international authority in the development of science-based standards for the dairy sector, IDF has an important role to play in ensuring the right policies, standards, practices, and regulations are in place to ensure the world’s dairy products are safe and sustainable.