Qantas sets up Tasmania-China milk run

In a further sign of China’s growing appetite for Australian agricultural products, Qantas has announced a partnership with VAN Dairy that will see fresh Tasmanian milk exported directly to the port city of Ningbo. By Peter Wells.
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Qantas Freight expects to carry more than 50,000 litres of fresh milk in the first six months of 2017 from Hobart, Tasmania’s capital, to Ningbo, the second-largest city in the Chinese province of Zhejiang. The milk run will initially operate weekly, “with a view to increasing the frequency to meet demand”.
VAN Dairy is owned by China’s Moon Lake Investments, which bought the operation, formerly known as The Van Diemen’s Land Company, earlier this year for A$280m. Established in 1825 in north-western Tasmania, VDL Farms owns and operates 25 dairy farms and milks approximately 19,000 cows, according to its web site.
Sean Shwe, managing director of Moon Lake Investments, said in a statement that the partnership would be a “game changer” for Tasmania:
There is a huge demand for fresh milk in China and the key to satisfying that demand is having a reliable freight partner with an established freighter network, infrastructure and support in China and expertise in handling fresh produce – Qantas provides that.
Establishing this trade bridge is an exciting venture for our dairy company, VAN Dairy who produce VAN milk, and opens the door for access for other Tasmanian producers of fresh, perishables such as seafood, fruit and vegetables to air freight their produce on this direct flight to China.
Moon Lake has picked Ningo and also Beijing as the initial distribution areas for fresh Tasmanian milk in China. It plans to branch out to Shanghai, Hangzhou and other cities once the product has been established.
While China’s demand for fresh milk – and Australian food exports more broadly – may be increasing, political and corporate sensitivities have been on the rise, too.
In September, Victoria’s Camperdown Dairy Company was banned by the Australian government from exporting to China owing to “milk quality issues”.
Midway through the year, Beijing decided to tighten regulations on imports of food and consumer goods, while orders of Devondale long-life milk and milk powder produced by Australia’s Murray Goulburn were barred on Alibaba’s Tmall web site. Shares in a number of Australian consumer companies that export to China, including vitamin and supplements company Blackmores, organic baby food maker Bellamy’s, a2 Milk Company and Bega Cheese were thumped at the time.
Shares in Bega Cheese have fallen sharply since October when the company revealed its partnership with Blackmores to export baby formula to Asia failed to live up to expectations.
 
Source: FinancialTimes
Link: https://www.ft.com/content/ea207b7c-7020-3255-88d3-da429b6b8013
 

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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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