Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia has teamed up with the home delivery food franchise, Aussie Farmers Direct, in a joint venture which will see the production of certified organic butter from a new manufacturing facility.
The $1.2m venture will include raw material handling, equipment and butter making machinery and will see the creation of a new butter processing facility, as part of an upgrade to the Aussie Farmers Dairy in Victoria's Camperdown.
Two different types of butter will be churned out: Aussie Farmers will convert its cream into Aussie Farmers branded butter packs, and a certified organic butter will also be produced using organic milk supplied by the 22 dairy farmers that make up the Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia. The latter will be sold under the Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia label and also under its second brand, True Organic.
Butter production is expected to kick off by the end of June 2013, if not before, and in its full first year should deliver between one- and two-million packs of butter.
Peter Skene, CEO, Aussie Farmers Dairy, said "We are incredibly proud to be partnering with Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia – they’re a very special group of organic dairy farmers and we appreciate the quality of supply and the credibility and expertise they bring to this joint venture.
"We believe our joint entry into the Australian butter market will not only benefit more local Aussie dairy farmers by providing a greater choice of buyers and volume of demand for their milk and cream, but will also help to support and strengthen the creation of additional jobs for the local community and give consumers the choice of a 100 percent Australian owned and produced butter range."
This is Organic Dairy Farmers of Australia's second direct investment in manufacturing in the past six months, following its joint venture with high-end French cheese maker, L’Artisan Cheese.
The joint venture will be music to the ears of dairy farmers across the country, who have struggled with cost cutting by the supermarket duopoly.
And it's not just Australian producers who are unhappy. Earlier this week angry dairy farmers in Brussels sprayed riot police and parliament structures with a fire hose full of milk, protesting agains unfair pricing systems. Read more here.