Australia’s largest dairyfoods processor revealed in April that it planned to build two new state-of-the-art facilities to grow its daily pasteurised milk business in New South Wales and Victoria.Work has commenced on the Melbourne-based processing plant, which is being built alongside Devondale’s existing Integrated Logistics Centre in Laverton.The sale of the five-hectare plot within the 100-hectare western Sydney industrial park was finalised with CSR Limited last month.
CSR Limited is leading building products company that operates in Australia and New Zealand. CSR's Property division focuses on maximising financial returns by developing surplus former manufacturing sites and industrial land for sale.
Devondale General Manager Operations Keith Mentiplay said now the new Sydney site was secured, work would soon begin on the new facilities.
“There is just over one year to go before we are scheduled to begin production and we are well on track to becoming the nation’s most efficient producer of daily pasteurised milk.”He said the former quarry site presented an ideal location for Devondale, with the new Erskine Park Link Road due to open in the next month providing easy access to the M7 Westlink Motorway.
“Erskine Park was an obvious choice for us. As well as excellent land quality and infrastructure, this location also gives us easy access to the major milk supply regions in NSW, to the north, south and west of Sydney.”CSR Limited General Manager Property Andrew Mackenzie said Devondale was a welcome new addition to Erskine Park.Mr Mackenzie, who is also a Director of the Penrith Business Alliance, said: "the Erskine Park industrial area has seen significant growth in the last ten years.”
He said the Penrith community would benefit from new job opportunities.Devondale is actively seeking to grow its milk supply in the Sydney region to support the new processing plant and recently held farmer meetings in Bomaderry, Taree West and Maitland.Mr Mentiplay said the response at the meetings was positive. “We had the opportunity to speak to more than 300 farmers about what we had to offer.“As a Co-operative, Devondale returns 100% of the profits from our operations to our dairy farmer shareholders.”
