Nairobi — In the cold misty hills of Limuru, David and Sue Brown have been making cheese for over 25 years. What started as a way to store their excess milk turned into Brown's Cheese.

A recent analysis estimated that between 1993 and 2020, the demand in developing countries for milk and dairy products will grow annually between 3.2 and 3.5 per cent; up from 168 million tonnes to 400 million tonnes. While the Kenyan dairy processing sector is dominated by large milk processors who concentrate on pasteurising milk, small processors like the Browns are turning to cheese. And 10 million litres of milk are used to make cheese in the country.

It is a good source of calcium, magnesium, fat-soluble vitamins depending on the cheese and varying amounts of the B vitamins. The Browns have managed to keep making the much-loved dairy product the traditional way. "Our cheese is natural. We do not add chemical colouring, coatings, mould inhibitors or unnatural flavour enhancement, as is the case with many products now on the market," says Mr Brown. They seem to have a motto: Keep it traditional and small. And that seems to be the approach taken by most of the cheese makers in the country.

Mr Jerome Millet, the farm manager of Eldoville, is also in the same business. He says the firm wants to keep it small to maintain the high quality cheese people have become accustomed to. His farm -located on a 17 acre plot in Karen- is processing 2,000 litres a day to make its cheese. Amazingly, the highest buyers are in the local market. "We export about five - 10 per cent to Uganda and Rwanda," he says. Mrs Brown notes that they make a wide variety of cheeses, nine in all, to get a wider market as opposed to concentrating on one type like the big Western cheese manufacturers. Mr Millet attributes to the growth of tourism and awareness created by events like the recentl Cheese and Wine Festival in Nairobi as avenues of public awareness about cheese.

It also gives an opportunity for some of them to launch new products like the Goat cheese made by Raka Milk Processors of Nyeri. Other factors are campaigns by the Kenya Dairy Board (KDB) to stimulate value adding, enforcement of dairy import levies (imports have dropped by 50 per cent from 230 tonnes to 100 tonnes) and improved export markets in the East African Community (EAC) and the Comesa region.

But according to Kalpa Padia, the director of Raka, it will take about ten years for the industry to reach international standards.

While attending a cheese-making training in Holland, she noticed that the cows there were specially fed to produce high quality milk. Unlike here, where they are forced to buy from different people, "We are never assured of high quality milk" she remarks. In a country that is expected to produce 3.5 billion litres of milk by the end of this year and with only 10 per cent being processed, milk is expensive. The Browns buy a litre at Sh23 and with no subsides like Europe.

Hence, the imported cheese even after all the taxes are added remain cheaper than the local brands. It takes about 100 litres to make 10kg of cheddar (a hard cheese) and the same amount to make 20kg of cottage cheese (a soft cheese). To fight the competition, the three cheese-makers have decided to use innovative packaging to attract customers. One good thing about cheese is that there are hundreds if not thousands of different cheeses in the world resulting from different animal milk, moulds and bacteria, and maturing times. Other factors would be the diet of the milk bearing animals. Soft, semi-soft, semi-hard and hard cheese is an adaptable food that can be eaten in many ways. The by-product "whey" can be used as pig food or turned into a powder, a main ingredient in performance supplements. The European Union and the US are now the main players in whey powders whose demand has increased from 350,000 tonnes in 1995 to 960,000 tonnes in 2005. "In business one cannot afford to be greedy. You start then you gradually build," says Mr Millet. Raka started small with 200 litres and now it is processing about 5,000 litres daily . "Taste" is the ultimatum approach for Brown's Cheese, to get more customers they have started introducing tasting tables in supermarkets and at the same time give serving suggestions as well as recipes posted on their website.

Although online ordering is slow, the Browns' get orders from as far as Laikipia and for such orders they use G4S, a courier service. More dairy bodies are coming into existence. In 2004, the Eastern and Southern African Dairy Association was formed to ease trading in dairy products.

Mr Kipkirui Arap Lang'at, the executive director, says that they are working on making the export tariffs and levies standardised in the region.