Battle for milk
OPINION: Fonterra may be on the verge of selling its consumer business in New Zealand, but the co-operative is not keen on giving any ground to its competitors in the country.
UHT operations manager, Donald Lumsden, says the first production marks a significant milestone for the Waitoa UHT site, which has transformed from a green field to a state-of-the-art milk processing facility in just 12 months.
"More than 500 people have been involved in the construction of the site and all their hard work has paid off. The first commercial production went smoothly and we produced 25,000 litres of cream ready for sale – this is a great result."
The site will enable Fonterra to increase its UHT production capacity by 100% over the next few years. It will process more than 100 million litres of milk per year when all five of its milk processing lines are up and running.
