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Cornell, Yili partner on cheese

Cornell University has signed its first research agreement with Chinese dairy producer Yili. “The Cornell-Yili partnership defines the type of public-private partnerships that are needed to increase research to create a thriving global agricultural economy and provide high-quality food products for a world that is predicted to soon reach 9 billion people,” said Martin Wiedmann, […]

Cornell University has signed its first research agreement with Chinese dairy producer Yili.

“The Cornell-Yili partnership defines the type of public-private partnerships that are needed to increase research to create a thriving global agricultural economy and provide high-quality food products for a world that is predicted to soon reach 9 billion people,” said Martin Wiedmann, the Gellert Family Professor in Food Safety in the Department of Food Science. “A specific benefit for Cornell and our students will be that international public-private partnerships like this will enable us to gain insights into global food-related challenges and opportunities.”

Cornell and Yili began exploring the idea of collaboration in 2014 and signed a Memorandum of Understanding the following April. That agreement calls for the partners to develop research programs that increase dairy product innovation and quality assurance, covering a range of advances from farm technology to milk processing and the creation of value-added dairy products.

Under the terms of the research agreement, Yili will provide funding for Cornell to develop a novel cheese product aimed at the Chinese market.

“They want to develop a new cheese product, made of milk components and ingredients which Asian consumers are more used to, such as soy proteins,” said Carmen Moraru, associate professor of food science, who is leading the project. “There are some technical challenges that we’re going to try to solve for them, using our knowledge of proteins and texturisation.”

“Research excellence is critical, but so is project management and practical application,” said Laura Spitz, interim vice provost for international affairs. “Partnerships and consortia participation enable us to do this – to operationalize our innovation.”

“Through solid collaboration between Cornell and Yili Group, both institutions will learn a lot from each other, and together grow as the world’s major powerhouses in their respected fields of expertise,” said Jiwu Yang, general manager of Yili Innovation Center. “We are looking forward to building a long-term and fruitful relationship with Cornell.”