Turkiye collects over 10M tons of cow milk in 2021

By Gokhan Ergocun

ISTANBUL (AA) – Turkiye collected over 10 million tons of cow milk in 2021, the country's statistical authority announced on Monday.

Cow milk production increased 2.1% last year versus 2020, according to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat).

In the January-December period, 1.5 million tons of drinking milk was produced, down 5.6% on an annual basis.

Data also showed that cheese production from cow's milk was down 0.5% on a yearly basis to 735,733 tons.

Cheese production from sheep, goat, buffalo, and mixed milk totaled 27,533 tons, up 1.3% over the same period.

Turkiye also produced 1.12 million tons of yogurt, almost 717,000 tons of ayran – salty yogurt drink – over 84,800 tons of butter, as well as some 41,200 tons of cream and 127,300 tons of milk powder from January to December last year.

In 2020, over 9.8 million tons of cow milk was produced in Turkiye, with 1.6 million tons of drinking milk production.

- Dairy exports up

In 2021, Turkiye exported dairy products worth $507.2 million, up 36.5% on an annual basis, according to the National Milk Council data.

Meanwhile, the country's dairy imports posted a decline of 34.6% to $55.7 million over the same period.

Iraq, Egypt and Algeria were the top destinations for the exporters of Turkish dairy products last year.