A decade of moderate economic gains has helped expand dairy consumption and, by extension, imports of U.S. products.

U.S. suppliers have an opportunity to play a bigger role in China’s booming UHT milk market.

Mexico remains the biggest customer for U.S. dairy products, purchasing a record $1.43 billion in 2013.

In 2013, America's cheese suppliers held the No. 1 global market share position.

China’s appetite for imported UHT milk could grow four-fold to more than 1.3 billion lbs. by 2020.

Through the first seven months of 2013, volume jumped 27 percent to 6,503 metric tons.

Dairy consumption in Indonesia, Vietnam and other countries should grow at a healthy rate through 2020.

An important component of nutrition security will be food aid, and it is an opportunity to raise dairy's profile even further.

When the history of the U.S. dairy industry is written, the highlights of the chapter on globalization circa 1995 to 2015 will include milestones like the cap on EU export subsidies, the opening of Mexico under NAFTA, the increase in dairy consumption as the middle class has grown in emerging markets, and the China melamine crisis. Now you can add the birth of the U.S. whole milk powder (WMP) industry to the mix of most significant, game-changing developments of the last 20 years.

Nina Bakht Halal is USDEC’s Middle East office representative, based in Beirut. In this Q&A, Halal answers questions about dairy marketing opportunities in the Middle East/North Africa.

In this issue, USDEC’s Middle East office representative provides a number of insights on the region. Among them: 1) the Middle East is erroneously seen as universally in turmoil; and 2) for U.S. suppliers to make inroads into what is a lucrative and growing dairy market, they need to put in more face time.

U.S. cheese exports grew nearly 16 percent in 2012, breaking the $1 billion mark for the first time. This was no fluke, no temporary spike in sales. This was a milestone more than a decade in the making.

The Middle East imports roughly 90 percent of the food it consumes—an astonishing figure that is unlikely to decline anytime soon. Limited water and limited arable land equal limited agricultural potential. At the same time, the region boasts significant purchasing power, a growing middle class, a large, youthful population, rapid expansion in the retail, foodservice and food manufacturing sectors, and historical familiarity with the nutrition inherent in dairy.

In all the media reports about the ambitious global expansion plans of McDonald’s, Subway and the Yum! family of restaurants (Pizza Hut, KFC and Taco Bell), it might seem like the mega-chains are the only international game in town. There is in fact a thriving, locally-based, foodservice-chain second tier in most emerging markets that is expanding rapidly, increasingly beyond national boundaries and into surrounding regions. Often specializing in U.S.-style fare, many of these restaurants are sizeable users of cheese and prime examples of growing but often-overlooked potential customers for U.S. dairy.

From Day 1, the U.S. Dairy Export Council’s (USDEC’s) message to the U.S. dairy industry has been one of global trade opportunities created by the rapidly expanding middle class in emerging markets. Higher per capita incomes for the middle class, particularly when coupled with population growth, equate to a significant rise in dairy consumption—so significant that traditional exporters and those markets’ own domestic industries would not become able to meet their needs.

U.S. cheese export value through July topped $680 million—well on its way to breaking the $1-billion mark, a more than seven fold increase over 2000. The United States is firmly planted as the No. 3 cheese supplier to the world and we are gaining share.

We’re in the right place at the right time. The global dairy industry is a growth sector―that much is crystal clear.

There was a time in the not-so-distant past when PepsiCo and Coca-Cola Co. would have been considered enemies of the dairy industry. Today, Pepsi and Coke’s investments in dairy processing operations and dairy-based new product development have not only made them partners to the industry, but also speak volumes about globalization, nutrition trends and future sector growth.

Regular readers of this column know U.S. dairy exports have been steadily rising over the past decade-plus. The volume of U.S. milk solids shipped overseas grew from the equivalent of 5.5 percent of total annual solids produced in this country in 2000 to 13.3 percent of solids produced last year. And as we mature as an exporting industry, the composition of those exports is changing. Not only are we exporting more dairy products, we are shipping a far greater percentage of higher value, higher profit items than ever before.

Since Jan. 1, at least 17 companies have announced significant plans to expand existing cheese manufacturing facilities or build new cheese plants. Geographically, the tally breaks out as follows: one in Japan, one in South America, three in Australia, six in Europe and six in the United States. That does not include projects that started taking milk over the past five months—like Brasil Foods’ new mozzarella plant in Itumbiara, Brazil—or new cheese capacity expansions that are on the drawing boards.