"The industry has benefited from robust global economic growth for much of the past five years, rising demand from the newly affluent economies of Southeast Asia and Latin America and clever product innovation," said IBISWorld industry analyst Naren Sivasailam. "This has been combined with falling supplies from dairy powerhouses, such as New Zealand and Australia, due to adverse climatic conditions and high feed costs."
The United States is the world's single largest cheese producer, followed by Germany, France and Italy. In the developing markets of India and China, cheese consumption has grown at a mid- to high double-digit rate due to increased urbanization, Westernized diets and rising incomes.
The global cheese manufacturing industry is characterized by a diverse range of participants, ranging from multinational giants as Kraft Foods and Fonterra to smaller dairy cooperatives and niche and artisanal producers. In the developed markets of Europe, North America and Australia, cheese production is largely a mature and saturated industry with limited growth opportunities for domestic manufacturers. The European market, for example, is highly fragmented with many small producers servicing niche domestic markets. In North America and Australia, the market is more concentrated with large multinationals and dairy cooperatives that produce the majority of the domestic cheese.
Over the next five years, industry prospects are expected to be relatively bright, driven largely by the forecast economic recovery, stability in dairy product prices and a resurgence in demand from the developing world. Product innovation in the form of functional and health-based cheese products is expected to generate renewed interest in the mature markets of North America, Oceania and the European Union.
