Milk drinkers now have two choices about which milk to choose when a new brand hit store shelves yesterday for the first time.

Dunkley?s dairy has a new competitor ? MarketPlace and Bermuda Creamery have teamed up to produce their own brand of filled milk available for sale at the MarketPlace stores Islandwide. Three varieties of milk are being sold in plastic containers of illed, skimmed, or two percent in the pint, half gallon and gallon sizes.

Sales were going well yesterday said a MarketPlace spokesman, with the gallon size a popular choice among family shoppers. He said the store decided to produce the milk because of the reasonable demand for the product, locally.

?We hope that the sale of milk will do well and bring down the cost of groceries in Bermuda.?

Stephen Dunkley, who runs Dunkley?s Dairy, which produces fresh and filled milk, said he welcomes the competition.

He has however, had calls from the public. ?I had to point out that it is reconstituted milk, it could be misleading in that the nutrition information is not posted on the bottle,? he said.

He said Dunkley?s Dairy will review its product including packaging it offers for sale before deciding if Dunkley?s will produce their own gallon size.

Chief Environmental Health Officer Estlyn Harvey said the milk is labelled under current laws but new food labelling laws which should be passed in Parliament this month will require producers to comply with a new set of standards. Government is testing the milk on a daily basis to monitor its fat and bacteria content, but has told The Creamery to install its own testing facility.