cheese making traditions with top quality standards

The company Mljekara Pađeni d.o.o was founded in 1999, initially as a small family owned dairy company that processed 130 liters of milk. Since its foundation, the company continuously invested in modernization of its facilities and product development, assured its quality further with HACCP and ISO 9001:2015 certification and employs 129 people today, who process 100,000 liters of milk per day. In addition to keeping up with modern technical developments for its production, product quality is further assured through a strict quality control of the raw material and through organoleptic, chemical and microbiological testing of final products.

The company’s product range includes yogurt, sour cream, milk, cottage cheese, fresh cheese, cream, sliced cheese and dairy spreads.

For sourcing of raw materials, the company cooperates with about 1,000 subcontractors from 22 municipalities in Herzegovina, Romania and the Podrinje area. Products are being sold throughout the entire country and part of the production is exported to Montenegro, Serbia, Croatia and Sweden.

To meet the increasing demand from its customers at home and abroad, the company decided to increase its capacity with an investment in a new cheese production line, packaging equipment and laboratory equipment as well as a building that houses the new production line.  The new equipment is energy efficient and also saves water in comparison to older equipment.

The company received free technical assistance to optimize its investment project and 15% grant cash-back after the successful project verification, funded by the European Union. 

With the investment, the company now meets a wide variety of standards, including:

• • Council Directive 92/46/EEC of 16 June 1992 Laying Down the Health Rules for the Production and Placing on the Market of Raw Milk, Heat-treated milk and milk-based products
  • Regulation (EC) 852/2004 of the European Parliament and European Council of 29 April 2004 on Hygiene of foodstuff
  • EN 1672-2 (2009) food processing machinery – Basic concepts – part 2: hygiene requirements
  • Regulation (EC) No 1935/2004 on materials and articles intended to come into contact with food and repealing Directives 80/590/EEC and 89/109/EEC
  • EU Regulation 2023/2006 on good manufacturing practice for materials and articles intended to come into contact with food