Context

The dairy sector is a strategic sector in the Catalan agrifood industry, due to both its economic importance and its contribution to the development and attachment of the rural population, which has been in a crisis since the end of the dairy quotas system, leading to the closure, transformation and diversification of several companies in the sector.
The increase in demand for local, quality and innovative products means that companies, in this case cheese makers, are considering developing new products to add value to milk and milk by-products in order to open up new sales markets, both nationally and internationally.
Currently, whey is a dairy by-product of cheese-making with high nutritional value, which is mainly composed of soluble protein fraction (whey proteins), residual fat, lactose, minerals and vitamins. In most dairies this by-product is currently discarded as waste, the cost of destruction being very high as it contains a significant load of organic matter (COD 70-80 g/l). The non-revaluation of this by-product by the dairies is a significant loss in economic, nutritional and environmental value. This problem is not exclusive to Catalan cheese dairies, but is a fact that exists on a global level.
In the case of whey from cow’s milk, there is a standardised titration for serum protein as part of infant formula to replace breast milk or for inclusion in sports nutrition. However, in the case of sheep or goat whey, these recovery routes do not exist, due to the small amount of whey produced globally.
Given these facts, the operational group formed by QUESERÍA MONTBRÚ SA and the dairy products company NAVIDOS joined forces to develop two innovative products where the main ingredient is a by-product from cheese production: whey.