Milk Production and Processing in Romania – Characteristics and Tendencies

Abstract

Milk and its derived products are a staple food in human nutrition. A suitable food system does not accept food rations which provide milk and milk products in their structure. These considerations have led to increased consumption of milk and its derivatives. For the future, it is predicts that both milk and milk products will occupy an important place in daily human consumption compared with other animal products. Occupying second place, in importance, the Romanian agriculture, after meat production, milk and milk products sector is one of the most important sectors of Romanian agriculture, representing in 2007, 25.03% of total agricultural production and 9.59% from animal production. The restructuring of Romanian agriculture has as a result reducing or even destroying the material base both in agriculture and processors industries. Also, reduction of livestock has like result the reduction of agricultural production animals - an important part of raw material in food industry. Milk production, a major component of animal production, it has faced such problems. Thus explains the decreasing trend in milk production for processing in the period 1990-2000, following a restructuring of the dairy sector industrialization, oversized compared to the productions obtained.

Keywords

• milk production
• self-consumption
• milk processing