Friday, 24 March 2023 14:15

Westland milk hits $1b revenue for first time

Written by  Sudesh Kissun
Westland Milk Products has surpassed $1 billion in annual revenue for the first time. Westland Milk Products has surpassed $1 billion in annual revenue for the first time.

Chinese-owned Westland Milk Products has surpassed $1 billion in annual revenue for the first time.

Owned by Yili Group since 2019, Westland Milk’s total revenue for 12 months ending December 31 2022 topped $1.04b. The company made a profit of $39 million.

Farmers who supply the West Coast processor received a record $9.40/kgMS for their milk in 2022.

Westland says it continues to pay farmers a 10c premium above the forecast Fonterra KgMS price. The company’s milk payout contributed $535 million into the West Coast and Canterbury economies.

Westland chief executive Richard Wyeth says the company’s strategy of focusing on high-value product sales, leveraging off the West Coast’s reputation as a source of premium dairy products and ingredients, is now paying dividends.

“This is the first time in our company’s 85-year history that we have surpassed the $1 billion dollar revenue mark,’’ Wyeth says.

“Having the support of Yili has enabled us to invest in our people and the infrastructure needed to increase production and sales of value-added products.

Wyeth says the turnaround in performance is also a result of a well-planned, whole-of-business approach to improve quality, reduce waste, increase sales, improve opportunities for staff and reduce costs of production.

“The biggest contributor to increasing revenue has been our high-value product strategy and to some extent high global commodity prices but right across the business we have focused on doing everything well,.

“Customers willing to pay a premium for high-value products have high standards. We’re working with our entire supply chain to ensure we can demonstrate these standards so that our customers can see for themselves the value of our ingredients and products.’’

Wyeth says the financial performance was well ahead of company projections and he remains optimistic about maintaining momentum and growth for Westland, despite ongoing international inflationary pressures and overall reductions in milk supply across New Zealand.

In 2022, Westland processed an 11% increase in milk solids year-on-year. This supported an operational cash conversion cost saving of 10 per cent year-on-year, equivalent to around $18 million.

While Westland was able to pay farmers a record price of $9.40KgMS in 2022, the recent milk price downgrade and ongoing impacts of inflation meant Westland would continue to take a cautious approach in managing costs to ensure it could continue to pay a premium.

More like this

Wyeth to head Synlait

Former Westland Milk boss Richard Wyeth is taking over as chief executive of Canterbury milk processor Synlait from May 19.

Top dairy CEO quits

Arguably one of the country's top dairy company's chief executives, Richard Wyeth has abruptly quit Chinese owned Westland Milk Products (WMP)

Milk price certainty

Westland Milk has reaffirmed its commitment to pay farmer suppliers 10c above Fonterra farm gate milk price for the following two seasons.

Featured

National

Machinery & Products

Gong for NH dealers

New Holland dealers from around Australia and New Zealand came together last month for the Dealer of the Year Awards,…

A true Kiwi ingenuity

The King Cobra raingun continues to have a huge following in the New Zealand market and is also exported to…

Data crucial to managing water

Watermetrics was formed as a water data collector and currently supplies and services modern technology such as flow meters, soil…

» Latest Print Issues Online

Milking It

Dairy power

OPINION: The good times felt across the dairy sector weren't lost at last week's Beef + Lamb NZ annual meeting.

» Connect with Dairy News

» eNewsletter

Subscribe to our weekly newsletter