Goats' milk gives PSM a healthy outlook

By Dita De Boni

A growing market for goats' milk calcium supplements has defied the economic recession in Asia and proved a profit-spinner for a local pharmaceutical maker.

PSM Healthcare has just opened a new warehouse and hermetically-sealed processing plant in Pakuranga, which has undergone a $1 million refit in order to produce the supplements to MAF specifications.

Five workers have also joined the company to run the goats' milk operation.

The supplements are being sold to both domestic and international Asian communities whose diets are typically low in calcium.

The tablets are specifically geared towards fostering bone development in lactose-intolerant Asian children.

PSM Healthcare CEO Kim Campbell said he had already sold "millions" of the tablets at home and abroad, with one south-east Asian company alone buying nine million tablets a month.

"We are seeing a huge growth in the industry, not only in goats' milk but in dairy-related nutritional products," he said.

"Goats' milk has much less lactose, and our customers love it that it comes from the clean, green hills of New Zealand, even though it would actually be cheaper to get the [goats'] milk from France."

Mr Campbell said persistence has paid off for PSM during the Asian recession.

"Our toiletries market fell away because the [Asian] consumers stopped spending on themselves, but our medical products continued to flourish.

"We just kept calling when everyone else stopped."