Another record result for Westland
Not all milk processors in New Zealand are struggling; just look at Westland Milk Products on the West Coast.
Dubbed the 'dairy silicon valley', the Global Smart Manufacturing Industrial Park of Yili Future Intelligence and Health Valley aims to serve as a global dairy hub.
With a total investment of over $1.2 billion, the park has four projects underway: a liquid milk production base, a milk powder production base, the Chilechuan Ecological Intelligent Pasture and the Yili Intelligent Manufacturing Experience Center.
Yili says the industrial park applies world-class equipment and takes full advantage of leading technologies such as artificial intelligence.
It claims the benchmarking production bases for liquid milk, infant formula and cheese at the park represent the world's largest scale of their kind, employing high levels of automation and digitisation.
The park is also home to six national platforms, including the National Center of Technology Innovation for Dairy and the National Metrology and Testing Center for Dairy Products.
Yili says the development of this industrial cluster is expected to boost regional economic growth and accelerate the growth of global health industries.
The liquid milk production base covers an area of about 950omu (equivalent to the field of play area of 89 FIFA World Cup stadiums) and employs world-leading digital equipment that can ensure unmanned, transparent,efficient and traceable production processes. It can process 6,500 tons of fresh milk per day, which can meet a megacity's daily demand.
The milk powder production base has an annual production capacity of 60,000 tons, which can feed 1.28 million infants per year. Yili say, as the world's largest infant formula production base, the park leads the industry in introducing the Intelligent Building Management System (IBMS), the Facility Management and Control System (FCMS) and applies a variety of cutting-edge interactive technologies.
Chilechuan Ecological Intelligent Pasture, a supporting farm for the park, occupies an area of 11,250mu and has received a total investment of $169m.
The park also houses the world's first 5D cinema, for industrial tours.
"This enables them to learn more about state-of-the-art dairy production models and the entire life-cycle of milk production.
"[The park] is expected to create direct and indirect employment opportunities for more than 350,000 people and attract a total of one million people to live in the region."
Yili owns two manufacturing sites in New Zealand - Westland Milk in Hokitika and Oceania Dairy in South Canterbury.
