Australian puts $30m into wine industry

By Libby Middlebrook

The New Zealand wine industry has been given another boost with a $30 million development in Hawkes Bay and Marlborough.

This week Australian businessman Terry Peabody announced plans to spend $20 million in Hawkes Bay on plantings, a winery and restaurant for his new wine label, Craggy Range Winery.

A further $10 million would be spent in Marlborough on plantings and another winery.

The Brisbane-based businessman, who owns trucking, waste management and construction businesses in Australia and Canada, said his family's interest in wine prompted him to establish a wine company.

"Quite a few years ago we started looking for a place to set one up - France, Australia and the US," he said.

"New Zealand was far less expensive than anywhere else we looked, with some of the best land for vineyards."

The Hawkes Bay development, which needs resource consent to go ahead, will include a cooking school and a private, five-suite lodge near Havelock North for the Peabody family to use.

Mr Peabody said it was also practical to set up a winery in Hawkes Bay because it took only three hours to fly there from Brisbane in the family jet.

His international business group, which had turnover of $2 billion in the past financial year, includes Canadian-based Western Star Trucks.

General manager Steve Smith, who holds a 5 per cent stake in Craggy Range Winery, said the company would target Australian, Canadian and US export markets, where Mr Peabody's businesses have a high profile.