EU trade flows
Market dataWhat Europe buys. What it sells.
The customs record of the EU-27's dairy trade with the rest of the world: every import and every export, by product and by partner country, monthly back to 2015.
Imports lead on this page on purpose. Exports say what Europe could sell; imports say what it had to buy — and for a trader that is usually the sharper signal.
Latest customs month
May 2026
Imports · last 12 months
614kt
+11.8% vs the year before
Exports · last 12 months
5,059kt
+3.5% vs the year before
Imports · value, last 12 months
2,190€ m
Exports · value, last 12 months
19,354€ m
What the EU imports
Extra-EU arrivals over the last twelve customs months, and the countries they came from.
Monthly imports
- May 2026
- Butter2.47 kt
- Cheese — total17 kt
- Skimmed milk powder3.65 kt
- Whole milk powder1.63 kt
- Whey & whey powder7.57 kt
Where it comes from · last 12 months
- United Kingdom221 kt56%
- Switzerland95 kt24%
- Ukraine22 kt6%
- New Zealand16 kt4%
- Norway14 kt3%
- United States13 kt3%
- Iceland2.9 kt1%
- Serbia2.4 kt1%
- Türkiye1.5 kt0%
- Bosnia & Herzegovina1.1 kt0%
- —All other countries965 t0%
Countries outside a product's top twelve are counted under "all other countries" — the totals and shares stay honest, the list stays readable.
What the EU exports
Extra-EU dispatches over the same twelve months, and where they went.
Monthly exports
- May 2026
- Butter31 kt
- Cheese — total119 kt
- Skimmed milk powder81 kt
- Whole milk powder18 kt
- Whey & whey powder58 kt
Where it goes · last 12 months
- United Kingdom579 kt17%
- China285 kt8%
- United States216 kt6%
- Algeria151 kt4%
- Indonesia137 kt4%
- Malaysia121 kt3%
- Saudi Arabia117 kt3%
- Japan117 kt3%
- Switzerland78 kt2%
- Egypt76 kt2%
- —All other countries985 kt28%
Countries outside a product's top twelve are counted under "all other countries" — the totals and shares stay honest, the list stays readable.
Product by product
Every dairy chapter of the customs tariff, each with its own partners, unit values and history. Cheese appears whole and split — the splits live inside the total, so they are never added together.
Butter
040510OpenImports42 kt+102.5%
Exports279 kt+17.9%
Butteroil & AMF
040590OpenImports32 kt+14.1%
Exports24 kt+12.6%
Dairy spreads
040520OpenImports352 t−42.5%
Exports6.4 kt+2.8%
Cheese — total
0406OpenImports205 kt+7.8%
Exports1,444 kt+3.3%
Fresh cheese & curd
040610OpenImports52 kt+6.1%
Exports488 kt+4.5%
Grated & powdered cheese
040620OpenImports7.0 kt+9.1%
Exports60 kt+4.2%
Processed cheese
040630OpenImports9.4 kt+42.2%
Exports132 kt+0.9%
Blue-veined cheese
040640OpenImports1.2 kt−5.0%
Exports21 kt+0.8%
Other cheese (incl. hard)
040690OpenImports136 kt+6.8%
Exports743 kt+3.0%
Gouda
04069078OpenImports5.5 kt+356.5%
Exports128 kt+3.8%
Mozzarella
04061030OpenImports29 kt−0.2%
Exports215 kt−1.9%
Skimmed milk powder
040210OpenImports46 kt+14.7%
Exports832 kt+15.7%
Whole milk powder
040221 · 040229OpenImports13 kt−20.9%
Exports179 kt−5.4%
Condensed milk
040291 · 040299OpenImports59 kt+23.2%
Exports284 kt−8.2%
Whey & whey powder
040410OpenImports84 kt+15.4%
Exports744 kt−1.1%
Milk protein concentrates
040490OpenImports2.0 kt−44.1%
Exports103 kt+0.9%
Casein & caseinates
350110 · 350190OpenImports11 kt−8.9%
Exports100 kt+20.8%
Lactose
170211 · 170219OpenImports29 kt−23.2%
Exports225 kt−11.0%
Cream
040140 · 040150OpenImports40 kt+6.0%
Exports230 kt−11.5%
Yoghurt & fermented
0403OpenImports50 kt+22.5%
Exports608 kt+8.9%
The same trade, as milk
What this is in raw milk
Every figure above is a processed product. Behind it is milk — and how much depends entirely on which component you count. This converts the whole basket back, on both components, and never adds the two.
Exports, last 12 months
On fat
20.4Mt milk
On protein
28.1Mt milk
Binding
The component that does not bind runs 27% below the binding one.
Imports, last 12 months
On fat
3.6Mt milk
Binding
On protein
2.8Mt milk
The component that does not bind runs 23% below the binding one.
The larger track binds: the milk pool has to carry both components, so whichever runs out first sets the milk actually needed. The other is then in surplus and goes into a different product. Adding the two would count the same litre twice — the cream churned into butter and the skim dried into powder come from one and the same milking.
The composition behind every conversion
Reference milk: 4.15% fat, 3.47% protein — the EU-27 pool, weighted by volume across member states. It is the same milk the valorisation tool prices against, so the two cannot say different things about the same litre.
| Product | Fat % | Protein % | kg milk / kg, fat / protein |
|---|---|---|---|
| ButterCN 040510, the EU minimum for butter is 80% fat; the trade makes 82%. | 82.0 | 0.6 | 19.8 / 0.2 |
| Butteroil & AMFCN 040590, anhydrous milk fat — the Codex standard is min. 99.8% fat. | 99.8 | 0.1 | 24.0 / 0.0 |
| Dairy spreadsCN 040520 covers dairy spreads from 39% to 75% fat. 60% is the midpoint of that band, not a measured average; this line is small and the assumption is stated rather than hidden. | 60.0 | 0.5 | 14.5 / 0.1 |
| Cheese — totalCN 0406 as a whole: everything from fresh curd to hard grating cheese. Weighted toward the semi-hard bulk that dominates the tonnage. | 27.0 | 24.0 | 6.5 / 6.9 |
| Skimmed milk powderCodex skimmed milk powder: max. 1.5% fat, protein min. 34% of the solids-not-fat. | 1.0 | 34.0 | 0.2 / 9.8 |
| Whole milk powderCodex whole milk powder, 26–42% fat; 26.5% is the standard commodity grade. | 26.5 | 25.0 | 6.4 / 7.2 |
| Condensed milkCN 0402 91/99, evaporated and condensed milk. Sweetened condensed carries added sugar, which dilutes both components; the figure sits between the two products. | 7.5 | 7.0 | 1.8 / 2.0 |
| Whey & whey powderCN 0404, sweet whey powder. Its protein is real protein in a real traded box: the cheese line counts only the fat and protein that ended up in the cheese, so counting the whey alongside it adds nothing twice. | 1.0 | 12.0 | 0.2 / 3.5 |
| Milk protein concentratesMilk protein concentrate, MPC70 as the trading grade. | 1.5 | 70.0 | 0.4 / 20.2 |
| Casein & caseinatesAcid casein, the bulk grade. | 1.0 | 88.0 | 0.2 / 25.4 |
| LactoseLactose carries neither fat nor protein, so a two-component method cannot see its milk at all. Left out and said so, rather than counted as zero — a zero in the table would read as 'no milk behind it', which is false. | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 / 0.0 |
| CreamCN 0401 40/50, cream above 6% fat. 40% is the standard traded strength. | 40.0 | 2.4 | 9.6 / 0.7 |
| Yoghurt & fermentedCN 040310, yoghurt — close to the milk it is made from, so its equivalent is near 1:1. | 3.5 | 4.0 | 0.8 / 1.2 |
Only lactose is left out, and not to avoid a double count: it carries neither fat nor protein, so this method is simply blind to it. Everything else is counted on what is actually in the box — which is why whey belongs in the basket. The milk behind a cheese and the milk behind the whey from that cheese are different halves of the same milking, not the same half counted twice.
Method
Milk on fat = product tonnes × the product's fat share ÷ the reference milk's fat share. Milk on protein is the same sum with protein. That is the entire calculation; every number in the table below can be checked with a calculator.
We derive rather than borrow. A published coefficient set would be shorter to quote and impossible to inspect: its losses, its reference milk and its product assumptions are not visible to the reader, so a figure built on it cannot be argued with. This one can.
What it measures is the milk embodied in the goods — the fat and protein actually in the box — not the milk a factory processed. A kilo of cheese reads about 7 kg of milk here, against the 10 the trade quotes as a yield: the missing three left in the whey, and in the cream standardised off and churned into butter. Both are separate lines in the same basket, so across the whole basket the pool is accounted for; per product it is not.
That is also why whey is counted rather than left out. It looks like a double count, and it is not: the cheese line only ever counts the fat and protein that stayed in the cheese. The whey is a different half of the same milking. Lactose is the one exclusion, and for the opposite reason — it carries neither component, so this method is simply blind to it, and a zero in the table would read as 'no milk behind it'.
The other side of the Atlantic
What the United States ships
June 2026Europe is not the only exporter these buyers can call. Twelve months of American exports from the customs record, per product — open one to see the American book against the European one, month by month.
- Butter112kt+132.5% vs the year beforelast 12 monthsThe American book →
- Cheese — total687kt+26.2% vs the year beforelast 12 monthsThe American book →
- Skimmed milk powder665kt−5.0% vs the year beforelast 12 monthsThe American book →
- Whole milk powder43kt+38.8% vs the year beforelast 12 monthsThe American book →
- Whey & whey powder562kt+11.1% vs the year beforelast 12 monthsThe American book →
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, USA Trade Online — public domain, credited as a courtesy. Retrieved 14 Aug 2026.
Extra-EU trade of the EU-27 aggregate. Flows between member states are a separate record and are never mixed in.
Customs data is living data: recent months are provisional and can be revised for a year or more. Every revision the daily ingest sees is recorded, never silently overwritten.