CSB - Simon Tucker - Fonterra's Director Global Sustainability

Catching up with our friends out of Fonttera, This week Simon Tucker, Director Global Sustainability and Stakeholder Affairs & Trade joins the show to talk about their recent trip to Japan with the PM. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Country Sport Breakfast with Brian Kelly on Gold Sport.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Time to catch up now with the team from Frontira
and today we're joined by Simon Tucker, Director of Global Sustainability,
Stakeholder Affairs and Trade. Simon, good morning.

Speaker 1 (00:17):
Thanks for having me today, Brian.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Absolute pleasure. Now, Simon, you were in Tokyo in Japan
last month as part of the New Zealand business delegation
accompanying our Prime Minister.

Speaker 1 (00:27):
How was that, Well, it's always good to visit one
of our bigger markets and I think support the efforts,
you know, for the New Zealand team to be on
the front foot internationally. It was a bit more challenging
getting there, but we won't go into broken plane stories today, Brian.
I mean Japan's a really sophisticated market. You know, the quality,

(00:52):
the technology that they use, just the refinement of their food.
You know, these are all things that come to mind
and I think they're very accurate about and I think
the good thing for us is they're very well aligned
to the keys to our business in that country. You know,
we're using our dairy science expertise to really I guess
you'd call it meat. A growing demand for foods that

(01:13):
support healthy living.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
So what does Fontier mainly sell in Japan.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Yeah, it's one of our most important markets for high quality,
innovative dairy ingredients. You know, protein is really the key here.
Many of our proteins are being specifically developed for that
market and individual customer applications. So you know, products like
high protein products like caseine, case andates way proteins, they've

(01:43):
been this driving force between our strong earnings in Japan.
It's a really very profit profit rich market for us.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
An example is any visitor to Japan who steps into
a seven eleven store and you'll find plenty of those.
They've got a good chance of finding Motify drinks fortified
with protein and yogurts which have got Fontira farmers milking them.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
Well, I'll be over there in a month. I must
keep an eye out for those in a seven and
eleven store. Then, simon any trends in particular that Fontira
is cashing in on.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yeah, I think famously. Now, you know, we understand Japan's
got an aging population and by twenty thirty, one in
three people in Japan are estimated to be over by
over sixty five years old and we know that, you know,
we've done research up there. We know Japanese consumers are
willing to pay a premium of up to fifty percent

(02:37):
for products that they think have got good health and
nutrition benefits. So you know, we see demand in that
area growing quite strongly, you know, well being mobility, combating
cognitive or physical decline. So we're really well placed to
get in on that trend. You know, our proteins are
assigned to help people maintain muscle mass for better quality

(03:00):
of life, dairy lipards helped to improve mood, and probiotics
support immunity and digestion. It's interesting, you know, I did
a couple of supermarket visits and there is just ile
after aisle with products that are aimed for sort of
healthy living and healthy aging. And I think that's a
great trend for us to be hooking into.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
Fantastic so I reckon we can expect to see a
lot of opportunity for our dairy coming from the Japanese market.

Speaker 1 (03:28):
Yeah, that's right, Brian, I think so. You know, it's
the words. It's the world's third or fourth largest economy,
depending on the value of the yen, and New Zealand's
fifth largest export market, So there's lots of opportunities, you know,
bring science and innovation, food and agriculture together. One other thought,
you know, grasp bed dairies playing pretty well in there

(03:49):
into products designed to promote healthy aging, and we think
the shifting demographics and aging society is a really good opportunity.
So you know we're going to be deep our partnership
with our long standing customers and new customers up there
to make innovative, high quality ingredients that make that meet
Japan's growing demand for deary nutrition.

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Exciting times in the Japanese market. Simon, thanks for joining
us this morning on the show. Thanks Brian Simon Tucker.
He is the director of Global Sustainability, Stakeholder Affairs and
Trade from from Fontira here on gold Sport. The