A fantastic year after a forgettable 2015. Parmigiano Reggiano, the king of Italy’s DOP denomination (in value) with more than €2 billion in sales, is celebrating a revival in 2016 (+12%) and preparing to scale up in international markets and regain market share in Italy thanks to a dedicated investment plan of €15 million from 2017 to 2020.

Producers want to make sure that higher anticipated production (+5.1%) from last year in the warehouse of reference (where some 3.47 million cheese wheels were left to age - 167,000 more than last year) and the forecast of an additional 0.8% increase in milk production in 2017, does not translate into lower prices but, on the contrary, to more exports. The goal is for the industry to be 45-50% export driven by the end of the four-year plan (today, it’s at 37%.).