Battle for milk
OPINION: Fonterra may be on the verge of selling its consumer business in New Zealand, but the co-operative is not keen on giving any ground to its competitors in the country.
Yet KFCs all over Thailand use milk from New Zealand farms, thanks to a recent custom partnership.
The key ingredient used is a cooking cream, from milk that is powdered, and then shipped to the Netherlands to be processed.
This specialised product, created for KFC but now spreading to other restaurants, makes Portuguese egg tarts - a permanent dessert item on the chicken outlet's menu.
The egg tarts are just one example of Fonterra's somewhat invisible efforts in Thailand to move milk into the country through its food service division.
And KFC is but one of 9000 outlets Fonterra says it services in the kingdom.
