The commitments
of the Roquefort collective

Savor the Roquefort cheese. A bouquet of nature is exhaled in contact with your taste buds, its aromas speak to you of a terroir. A feeling of well-being wins over you: a whole world of taste opens up to you. This is what Roquefort is: a commitment to the service of a pronounced taste, a pronounced commitment to the service of taste.

The taste of nature

Roquefort is the cheese of a thousand-year-old tradition made up of simple and natural ingredients : a terroir of origin, ewes grazing, raw and whole milk, a microscopic and natural mushroom, Penicillium roqueforti and the magic of the cellars of ripening in the rock.
A PDO which preserves the balance of the local ecosystem : the shepherds take out the herds, which graze, interact with the fauna and the flora ; open spaces; preserve biodiversity and landscapes. Causses and Cévennes, listed as World Heritage by Unesco.

The taste of the land

Thousands of years ago, on the great southern causses, man lived by raising sheep. Here, neither wheat nor vine. The sheep’s milk flows and encounters, by necessity of conservation, the coolness of the caves. A great cheese with the taste of its terroir is born : Roquefort
Roquefort, grateful, cultivates a pronounced taste for its terroir of origin. PDO loves its country. It develops employment, professions and specific know-how there. It shapes a living and vivacious country :

The 7 manufacturers of Roquefort collect the milk in the geographical area of the PDO and even in the most remote small areas, ensuring the maintenance of many traditional farms.

The 8 dairies spread over the territory of the PDO process the milk from the farms that surround them, reducing transport.

Each farm, each cheese factory employs many trades, adding to the 3,000 breeders and 2,000 employees in the cheese production, many jobs in very diversified fields. This economic and social dynamism preserves a living area in rural areas: schools, services, shops, cultural life, etc.

Tha taste of well-being

In the land of Roquefort, time, like space, stretches out, leaving more room for humans and animals. The professions of breeder and cheese maker are the fruit of a tradition that has remained deaf to the sirens of productivism and intensification.
The herds graze as soon as weather conditions permit. Being outside and eating grass is in the sheep’s first nature.
The sheepfolds shelter the herds at night and when the weather is bad. They are spacious and comfortable.
Fodder, herbs, cereals… produced on the farm, are of high quality and contribute to a balanced diet for the health of the herd.
The know-how of cheese makers and ripeners is transmitted and perpetuated in dairies on a human scale and natural aging cellars.

Well-being rhymes with sharing and social connection. Roquefort enjoys a collective organization for more than 90 years and many human interactions. This creates mutual aid in the sector and raises the level of quality of work and production thanks to common tools :
A Raw Milk Quality Service for the entire sector which, through its knowledge, expertise and technical support, helps everyone to achieve very high quality raw milk for a great PDO.
Services organized around breeders to support them technically in their breeding (Breeding Department and Unotec-Ovitest ).
A Communication Department to collectively promote the PDO Roquefort and its sector.
A PDO service that guarantees transparency and control over compliance with the specifications and defends Roquefort throughout the world.

The taste loud and clear

Roquefort has been the great PDO of taste since 1925. With its blue cheese, raw sheep’s milk, and its famous blue-green moulds, it embodies taste, the real thing, and pleads for diversity.
The taste of Roquefort does not yield to the standardization of flavors. Yes, eating Roquefort takes on a militant character. But, beware, a positive, joyful and communicative militancy to keep a diet
connected to Nature; to transmit, learn and cultivate very French pleasures on a daily basis. Let’s not forget that the French gastronomic meal is part of the world’s intangible cultural heritage. So, the taste, loud and clear with Roquefort !

Slice of history

“A small study room, whitewashed, clean and bright”. This is the description by animal writer Élian-J. Finbert, in his book “La Vie pastorale”, of Mas Émile-Masclet: a training center for learning the profession of shepherd, created in 1947 by the General Confederation of Roquefort, already concerned with perpetuating agro-pastoral practices. Emile Masclet was president of the Syndicate of Roquefort cheese makers.

Continue discovery …