Massive milestone for cheese factory

Stirling cheese factory workers Morgan Watt, Craig Sneddon and site manager Dwayne Smith with ...
Stirling cheese factory workers Morgan Watt, Craig Sneddon and site manager Dwayne Smith with cheese produced at the factory. Photo by Samuel White.

Staff members at Fonterra's Stirling cheese factory have been celebrating a production milestone.

About 50,000 metric tonnes of cheese have been produced at the South Otago site for the 2015-16 season, with 2.5 million blocks of 20kg cheese rolling of the production line.

The "fantastic'' result reflected growing demand for Fonterra's cheese in international markets, site manager Dwayne Smith said.

Cheddar prices had fared well this season compared with milk prices and commodity products and demand had continued to be strong in key strategic markets, Mr Smith said.

The factory produced ten 20kg blocks of cheddar cheese every minute, which was exported to markets around the world, including Japan, Australia, Korea and the Caribbean, where it was turned to a variety of formats and uses.

In Japan, the cheese was used for processing and shredded for consumer and foodservice purposes.

In the Caribbean and Australia, it was cut or sliced for consumer and foodservice use in supermarkets, hotels, restaurants and bakeries.

Korea had continued to develop as the primary market for Stirling's specialised low-salt cheese, with demand for retail product strengthened by the recent Korean Free Trade Agreement.

Korean consumers were particular about the amount of salt in their diets.

The Stirling factory, which opened in 1983, was built by the Otago Cheese Company, formed after the merger of three small South Otago dairy companies.

In 2010, Fonterra spent $7.75million upgrading the factory, bringing new product options to the site, which also specialises in whey protein concentrate and lactose concentrate.

Fonterra's southern operations manager Richard Gray said the factory produced about 15% of Fonterra's cheese.

It employed about 100 people who made an "awesome'' team.

Not only had it been a record production year, but the team had driven a significant amount of improvement to increase the plant's capacity by about 5%, Mr Gray said.

The factory used more than 300 million litres of milk sourced from South Otago dairy farms and further afield.

The South Otago area was well known for the good flavour profile it produced in cheese, he said.

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