Mejeriforeningen

About Mejeriforeningen

Mejeriforeningen, registered as MEJERIFORENINGEN DANISH DAIRY BOARD, is the trade organisation of the Danish dairy industry, an association with limited liability (forening med begrænset ansvar) at Agro Food Park in Aarhus, entered in the Danish company register under CVR 26088100 with effect from 1 January 2001.^[1] It is a membership body: its members are the Danish co-operative and private dairies and the trading houses that export Danish dairy products and import foreign ones, it is led by a six-member board, and it is itself a member of the farming and food organisation Landbrug & Fødevarer.^[2] No company sits above it: its LEI record reports neither a direct nor an ultimate accounting consolidation parent, giving the reason as "no known person".^[3][4]

The body is older than its register entry: it was founded in 1912 as De samvirkende danske Mejeriforeningers Fællesorganisation, became Danske Mejeriers Fællesorganisation in 1972 and took its present name in 1997, and almost every Danish dairy, co-operative or private, belongs to it.^[5] It is the former owner of the Lurpak mark, which is what ties it to this site: after the European Commission attacked the state-owned lurmærke in 1988 as a trade barrier, administration passed from the Ministry of Agriculture to the Danish dairies' joint organisation in 1991 and the rights themselves were transferred to it free of charge in 1997, and in 2012 Mejeriforeningen sold them on to Arla Foods amba for DKK 150 million.^[6][7] Member dairies other than Arla keep the right to use the Lurpak designation for butter made at their own plants in Denmark or under contract at Arla's dairies, so the mark's quality rules remain a matter for the association.^[7] The association administers trademarks, funds, climate accounting and marketing for its members and runs the dairies' school milk scheme.^[2] Since 2009 its staff have worked with Landbrug & Fødevarer under the name Sektor Mejeri, from Agro Food Park in Skejby, Axelborg in Copenhagen and the Danish Dairy Board's office in Brussels.^[2] The LEI register carries the entity as active, with the identifier 529900T0WFEBXN1RKO63 and a headquarters address at Agro Food Park 13.^[8]