Fonterra Australia will spend NZ$141 million (US$93.12 million) to build a cheese plant at its Stanhope factory in Australia.
The new facility will replace the hard cheese plant, which was destroyed by fire in December 2014, with a larger, modern facility that will produce cheeses for Australian consumer, foodservice and export markets.
“The new state-of-the-art facility will be able to produce 45,000 mt of cheeses each year including parmesan, Gouda and mozzarella, an increase of 15,000 mt from the previous plant,” says Fonterra Oceania MD Judith Swales.
“The plant will leverage our footprint in 100 markets and also the recent free trade agreements with China, Japan, and Korea.”
The multi-million dollar project will secure the future of the site and generate up to 30 jobs and is being supported by the Victorian Government through its Regional Jobs and Infrastructure Fund.
Construction of the new plant will begin next year, and is expected to be completed in 2017.
