Friday, 25 May 2012 10:47

Fonterra ‘regrets’ Couper resignation

Written by 

Fonterra's chairman Henry van der Heyden says the board regrets Simon Couper's decision to stand down as Shareholders Council chairman.

"But if Simon is uncomfortable, he has done the right thing by the cooperative," he says.

"The board is grateful to Simon for his eight years of service to Fonterra."

Couper resigned yesterday after expressing reservations about TAF's ability to maintain 100% farmer control and ownership. The new chairman Ian Brown has expressed support for TAF.

Van der Heyden says the Shareholder Council had pulled out all stops to complete their due diligence on TAF in order to provide shareholders with their independent evaluation of the package before farmers had their final vote on June 25.

"When we are making such a significant decision to protect the cooperative, it is important that the board and council are able to stand shoulder to shoulder. So the board is delighted to have council's support," Sir Henry said.

"When we announced the special meeting we said that we wanted to have this final vote to unify the cooperative. With board and council unified on Trading Among Farmers we are now a long way down that track."

The notice of meeting pack will be mailed to shareholders at the end of next week and the board is encouraging all shareholders to exercise their vote and to have their say.

More like this

Featured

Global Trade Uncertainty 'Likely To Remain'

Global trade has been thrown into another bout of uncertainty following the overnight ruling by US Supreme Court, striking down President Donald Trump's decision to impose additional tariffs on trading partners.

National

Machinery & Products

» Latest Print Issues Online

Milking It

Disunity is death

OPINION: Staying with politics, with less than nine months to go before the general elections, there’s confusion in the Labour…

Indian FTA

OPINION: Winston Peters' tirade against the free trade deal stitched with India may not be all political posturing by the…

» Connect with Dairy News

» eNewsletter

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter