China has ended its zero-covid policy and people are able to get on with their daily lives - which is good news for Fonterra.
There had been strong growth in consumption over the last few months, the chief executive of Fonterra’s Greater China business, Teh-Han Chow said.
The end of the Covid-zero policy and a drop in infection also coincided with the Spring Festival Lunar New Year, on January 22, Chow told The Country Sport Breakfast’s, Brian Kelly.
“Spring Festival, which is also known as Chinese New Year, is a traditional festive holiday for family gatherings, gifting, travelling to hometowns and stuff like that.
Government statistics indicate that 308 million people travelled during Spring Festival this year.
While this is an increase of 23 per cent over the previous year - and the highest since 2020 - it is still only 89 per cent of pre-covid numbers.
Chow said he’d noticed a change during the lockdowns.
“People’s behaviours shifted more towards a focus on health and wellbeing and you could see that coming out of covid ... we’ve seen a really strong growing recent demand for probiotics from our customers.”
This gave Fonterra new opportunities to provide customers with products and innovative solutions that supported the good health and nutrition of consumers and their families, he said.
Chief executive of Fonterra’s Greater China business, Teh-Han Chow. Photo / Supplied
As for the future, the co-op will focus on value-added products, sustainability, locally driven innovation, and local strategic partnership, Chow said.
“I think sustainability is increasingly important to our customers and they are ... gaining [an] understanding of what [it] means. So we want to make sure that we play to that.
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“We will continue to grow the value of our co-op by staying in tune with our customers and matching Fonterra’s dairy expertise with customers’ tastes.”
Fonterra was well-placed to collaborate with its Chinese customers and consumers and support emissions reductions across their supply chains, Chow said.
