The Country 04/03/26: Matt Bolger talks to Jamie Mackay

Fonterra’s Managing Director of Co-op Affairs reviews another stunning GDT result overnight (up 5.7%) with SMP leading the charge at 9.1%. We also look at staff safety and operations in the Middle East.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Matt Bulge is his name. He is Fonterra's managing director
of co op Affairs and the son of the former
late Great Prime Minister Jim Bolger, who I mistakenly called
Sir Jim, but he didn't want a knighthood. Matt. I
want to get back onto the serious issues of the day.
I've touched on this one with Michael Harvey from Rabobank.
But this five point seven percent jump surge almost in

(00:22):
the GDT with skim milk powder nine point one percent.
I know that's a great result, but was it unexpected?

Speaker 2 (00:29):
You look, the markets doing some interesting things at the moment,
but we it is a great result. That's five in
a row now since the start of the year of
upward results. The futures were looking positive and I guess
you all, there's a lot of milk growth out there
around the world. Buyers are comfortable at these prices, and
so yeah, it's great to have another good result overnight.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
I hate to use the ten number on you, but jeez,
we've got to be looking at it, Matte.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Come on wondering how long it it take you to well?

Speaker 1 (00:59):
I just wanted that it was my second question, not
my first one, but it's got a sniff of ten
dollars about it.

Speaker 2 (01:06):
Look, well, we'll be out at the end of March
with our first half results, and of course we'll always
look at milk prices. But no, obviously we'd just recently
put the price back up to the midpoint of nine
point fifty in this their outlook. But I guess if
there's any any headline thing here, it is just it's
a world of volatility, both what's happening in Iran in

(01:28):
the last few days, but also around supply and demand.
So while it's looking pretty positive, there's still a pretty
volatile world out there.

Speaker 1 (01:35):
There's a lot of supply out there. There's almost a
milk glutt It seems to be all finding a home
at the moment. But where where's the New Zealand season tracking?
Because we know for a lot of the North Island,
which was getting dry before Christmas, I've had plentiful rain
too much in some cases, so nearly all of New
Zealand's in a really good grass growing situation at the moment.

(01:56):
So you're I'm assuming that Fonterra and the dairy industry
will finish the season with a bit of a wet sail.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, has been interesting summer and lots of ways and
of course first thing to note as well, it's good
for grass growth. Has actually been a lot of pretty
challenging weather events around, whether that's wind or rain and
the whole lot. But certainly where I'm based in the Waikato,
you know, it's looking very green for early March. So yeah,

(02:26):
across the board in New Zealand, we're probably about three
percent up on last year with really good grass growth
and obviously positive milk prices meaning that farmers are keeping going.
So despite that, in despite all the milk coming out
of the US and Europe, the demand's still there. So
I guess the key thing there is that demand for

(02:47):
dairy is strong and it's not just one region in
one country. It's a cross China, Southeast Asia, Middle East.
Across the board it's been very positive.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
Where James Robertson, very dynamic young man, chief of st
twenty nine years of age for Fonterra. On yesterday's show,
he was wearing his Young Farmer or former Young Farmer
of the Year hat, but when I asked him about
Fonterra and the Middle East, naturally is chief of staff.
He was very concerned about all the people you've got
in the Middle East. They're all safe and sound.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
I take it, yeah, they are in Thanks for asking.
I think that's the first thing we think of is,
of course the human side. So it's a pretty unstable
environment Bearsville know from watching the news. So we've got
staff based in an office to buy there, and we
have got a manufacturing facility in Saudi as well. All

(03:38):
of our people are safe and accounted for in sheltering,
and of course we're watching that side. We're also watching
the logistics side because obviously this is pretty disruptive on
shipping and the team are working very closely with the
shipping companies to see how that's going to play out.
But of course it's very early days and I think
it's probably unclear exactly how that's going to develop up

(04:00):
over the next couple of weeks.

Speaker 1 (04:01):
Matt Bolger, Managing Director co op Affairs for Fonterra, Happy
days for New Zealand dairy farmers. Today was a great result.

Speaker 2 (04:08):
Yeah, great, thanks Amy Well