Spanish-inspired cheese wins at Virtual Cheese Awards The second year of the Virtual Cheese Awards in association with Food and Drink Wales ended with La Fresca Margarita, a fresh young cow’s milk cheese produced by Feltham’s Farm named the Best British cheese.
Joint silver went to Harvey & Brockless by Cellar Dairy for its goats cheese Blanche and Butler’s Farmhouse Cheeses for its oak-fired Red Leicester Smouldering Ember; Wyke Farms was awarded bronze with its Ivy’s Reserve Vintage Cheddar.
The Virtual Cheese Awards was created in 2020 by Sarah de Wit to celebrate and support Britain’s cheese industry during the Covid-19 pandemic which threatened to decimate the industry.
13th May 2021
Lidl GB has revealed that it is working with supplier Wyke Farms to create a carbon-neutral Cheddar by the end of this year.
Said to be a supermarket-first, the discounter is working directly with the Somerset-based dairy firm, and its farming base, on the project as part of its wider drive to reduce carbon across its supply chain.
Through sustainable working practices, Wyke Farms will aim to save 22.5 million kgs of CO2 per year, the equivalent weight of more than 1,875 double-decker buses. Lidl highlighted that chilled cheese is the second biggest carbon emitter in the supply chain.
The Cheddar is set to reach carbon neutrality by the end of the year through a mixture of sustainable farming, improved business practices and the purchase of âgold-standardâ carbon credits. Shoppers at Lidl will see the discounterâs carbon-neutral pledge on its Deluxe Cheddar products from this week.
Lidl unveils carbon-neutral cheddar cheese
In what it claims is a first in the UK s supermarket sector, Lidl GB has announced plans to begin selling cheddar certified as carbon neutral this year.
Image: Wyke Farms
The cheddar will come from supplier brand Wyke Farms, with the certification initially set to cover Lidl Deluxe Cheddar products before being rolled out to other lines.
Lidl has said it will work with Wyke Farms and its network of farmers to support them to adopt more sustainable practices on farms, enabling them to make energy, water and resource use more efficient while supporting carbon sequestration. Key focus areas will be feed management, soil and land management, manure management, herd management and energy management. These measures should reduce annual emissions by 22.5 million kilograms of CO2e.
The project will see Lidl work directly with Wyke and its farming base to implement sustainable farming
Lidl and dairy supplier Wyke Farms have joined forces in a bid to create what the discounter claimed would be the first carbon neutral cheddar to be listed in a UK supermarket.
The project will see Lidl work directly with Wyke and its farming base to implement sustainable farming and business practices and facilitate the purchase of carbon credits – permits which allow a company to emit a certain amount of CO2 emissions.
Specific efficiency measures set to be taken included cutting down on fertiliser use, converting farms to deforestation-free feed or using low food-mile feedstuffs. Meanwhile, the carbon credits are to come under the standards of climate NGO The Gold Standard Foundation.
Supermarket first : Lidl and Wyke Farms to serve up carbon neutral Cheddar cheese
Jessica Rawnsley
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Credit: Lidl / Wyke Farms
Supermarket and dairy brand team up to develop more sustainable on-farm working practices alongside purchase of gold standard carbon offset credits to boost green credentials of cheese
Cheddar cheese looks set to be given a green makeover in Lidl stores, with the supermarket chain today announcing it has teamed up with dairy brand Wyke Farms to develop a carbon neutral cheddar cheese, which is earmarked for launch before the end of the year.
In what it claims is a supermarket first , Lidl is co-creating the climate-friendly cheese with Wyke Farms as part of its efforts to reduce CO2 across its supply chain and shift towards more sustainable farming practices.