Celebrating Te Awamutu staff – from left, Carl Stevens, Jonathan Milne, Marc Carney, Penni Gibson, Alan van Der Nagel, Haley Davis, Simon Gemmell and Hayleigh Evett.
The award winning Te Awamutu plant has been honoured again at Fonterra’s Best Site Cup Awards.
The plant, which supplies 10 per cent of butter in the Greater China region was awarded the Greater China CEO Special Quality Cup.
The Best Site Cup awards are the Fonterra’s “Oscars of Manufacturing”.
Fonterra’s manufacturing team is 7000 strong and the Best Site Cup awards recognise successes in delivering top quality dairy products to the world.
At the awards the Co-operative’s butter plant in Te Awamutu was recognised by the Fonterra CEO of Greater China, Teh-Han Chow, for supplying at least 10% of Greater China’s volume for a particular Product Group – with a zero defect rate. The cup was created this year to celebrate Fonterra’s growth in that market.
Fonterra has seen significant growth from their China business over the last 20 years.
“I am immensely proud of the team’s achievement and the recognition from the CEO of Greater China, Teh-Han Chow,” said Fonterra Te Awamutu Operations Manager, Marc Carney.
“Almost one in three tankers of product is now heading into the China and we recognise the significance quality has on confidence in marketplace. Over 18,000 thousand tonnes of butter defect free requires all the processing and support teams to be on their toes,” he said.
The award “further cements my confidence in our team’s quality focus”, he said.
Te Awamutu’s site employs more than 290 people and produces milk powders, buttermilk powder, butter and anhydrous milk fat.
It made headlines last September by transitioning away from coal to be powered solely on wood pellets.
During peak season, the site processes three million litres of raw milk, more than one million litres of cream, and 750,000 litres of buttermilk each day.
