Swales looks for growth factor

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HER first job was a neighbourhood milk run, but now Judith Swales runs Australia’s second- biggest dairy processor with the sort of zeal that reflects the huge opportunities fast opening up to the sector.

After accumulating a food industry and management career pedigree that seems set to see her drive significant expansion at Fonterra Australia, as its managing director admits she feels “very much at home” back in the dairy game.

A milkman’s daughter who grew up in rural Yorkshire in northern England, Ms Swales has quickly seized the chance to get on-farm and into the marketplace since taking the top job at Fonterra 14 months ago.

“I love the connection back to the land, the farm environment and the depth of understanding farmers have,” she said.

“I’ve tried to spend as much time on farms as possible, especially when I first joined the company.

“You can’t take anything for granted – as a company you have to compete as hard to win your milk suppliers as your customers.”

Ms Swales – whose management experience started as a graduate trainee with big British retailer Marks and Spencer and spanned book selling and tyres before more recently heading-up Heinz Australia – doesn’t let the grass grow under her feet.

Within six months of joining Fonterra she oversaw the company’s purchase of Tasmania’s Tamar Valley Dairy business, which has about 170 staff and a fast-developing national yoghurt brand.

In April, Fonterra further extended its consumer products footprint signing a 10-year deal with Woolworths to supply the retailer’s $1-a-litre housebrand milk in Vic and cream – the company’s first big-scale move into the fresh, pasteurised milk market.

The agreement, estimated to be worth about $60 million a year, involves the New Zealand-owned Fonterra spending $30 million on technology upgrades at its milk factory at Cobden in Victoria’s Western District.

Ms Swales is also eager to sign up more farmers to supply the Australian operation, which handles 1.6 million litres a year at 10 milk plants in Victoria, Tasmania and southern NSW.

With initiatives to revitalise supplier confidence and investment, Fonterra Australia plans to grow its milk intake by almost a third or 100 million litres annually within five years.
Ms Swales said the “opportunity rich” dairy sector had to move quickly to keep up with an insatiable hunger for dairy products in booming Asian and Middle East markets.
Mature western markets, such as the United States, were also experiencing a dairy consumption resurgence, and potential existed to cash-in on renewed recognition of the wholesome, healthy benefits of more dairy in the Australian diet.
Responding to feedback gained from her farm visits and other negotiations with farmer groups, she has announced an “industry-leading”, transparent milk payment backed up by a support strategy pitched at building confidence and farm profitability.
She said milk price was important to Fonterra’s 1300 milk suppliers but profitability was more important.
“We’ve done a lot of homework with our farmers and the Bonlac Supply Company (the farmer-owned cooperative contracted to source Fonterra’s milk needs); we wanted to make sure they got the best milk price and could make the best milk production decisions based on capacity and profit goals,” Ms Swales said.
“We all need the Australian milk pool to grow.
“By 2020 the world is expected to have a 100 billion-litre a year gap between supply and demand for milk products.
“Australia only produces 10 billion litres – there’s great potential for us out there.” She said support specialists were being deployed to help Fonterra farmers plan ahead for profitability and growth and manage input costs more effectively.
Finding more cost-effective energy strategies for farmers’ electricity-hungry milking infrastructure was a typical hot spot.
 
Source: The Australian Dairy Farmer

Mirá También

Así lo expresó Domingo Possetto, secretario de la seccional Rafaela, quien además, afirmó que a los productores «habitualmente los ignoran los gobiernos». Además, reconoció la labor de los empresarios de las firmas locales y aseguró que están «esperanzados» con la negociación entre SanCor y Adecoagro.

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