Sugar hit
OPINION: Winston Peters has described the decision to sell its brand to Lactalis and disperse the profit to its farmer shareholders as a 'short sighted sugar hit'.
Firstly, they were accused of dumping nitrates onto its farms dotted around manufacturing sites.
Then came the news that 170,000 litres of skim milk spilled into the Tasman Sea from its Whareroa plant in Taranaki.
The leak left globules of fat dispersed along the foreshore of Ohawe and Waihi beaches, near Hāwera.
In a similar mishap in 2008, the dairy giant spilt 110,000 litres of skim milk into the ocean from the same plant.
In a statement, Fonterra says a valve fault caused milk to overwhelm the plant’s wastewater system, which released milk into the waste water drain instead of it reaching its intended location in another milk silo.
