New Zealand dairy co-operative Fonterra has announced that it has completed work on a new mozzarella plant at its Clandeboye site in south Canterbury, doubling production of the world-famous cheese and creating enough mozzarella to top more than 300 million pizzas a year.
According to the company’s media release, the mozzarella plant is the first of its kind in the world, with the mozzarella produced there intended for pizza and pasta restaurant chains across China, Asia and the Middle East.
“The expansion at Clandeboye is a great example of our V3 strategy in action. Foodservice products such as cheese give a high value on return and, thanks to our strength in research and development; we’re able to cut months off the production time of this mozzarella to deliver on our velocity proposition. The additional capacity will bring volume to that equation,” said Fonterra Managing Director of Global Operations Robert Spurway.
“We’re seeing the popularity of cheese really take off in Asia, so the timing of this upgrade couldn’t be better. To meet orders from that market, we will be producing cheese 24 hours a day, making use of our new lines and taking winter milk from our farmers in Canterbury, Southland and Otago,” said Clandeboye Site Manager Steve McKnight.
The expansion is part of Fonterra’s strategy to target food service, along with the doubling of cream cheese production at Te Rapa, the recent commissioning of the Waitoa UHT site and plans to expand slice-on-slice cheese capacity at Eltham.
Clandeboye is one of Fonterra’s largest manufacturing sites, processing up to 12.4 million litres of milk per day. With the expansion, 25 new jobs have been created at the site. The staff has finished training and the plant began production last week.
