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| Thursday, 17 June 2004 |
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Cargills to invest Rs 950 m to boost dairy business by Sudarshana Perera Cargills Quality Dairies (Pvt) Ltd, a subsidiary of Cargills (Ceylon) Limited will scale up its dairy based business in Sri Lanka that would help revive the local dairy industry. The company will invest Rs. 250 million to expand its existing factory at Banduragoda and would also go for a Rs. 700 million new liquid milk and yoghurt processing plant. Company officials who met President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga recently has called for donor assistance to provide more cows to farmers. Managing Director of Cargills Quality Dairies, Dr. Jagjit S. Punjrath told the Daily News that the company after experiencing a spiralling market for its products would focus to capture the Middle East, South Indian and Singaporean market. "We will stabilise and expand our existing factory with state-of-the-art refrigeration system to increase manufacturing capacity and ours will be the largest ice cream manufacturing plant in the region. We would also expand our marketing network. The earmarked ventures would provide more than 300 job opportunities while benefiting more than 600 dairy farmers", Dr. Punjrath said. "The company is targeting to promote the benefits on the consumption of liquid milk and our new manufacturing plant will process liquid milk based products. We want to pay a higher price for farmers and to sell products at affordable prices. Since the present government is keen on self sufficiency, we would extend our fullest cooperation to revive this sector", he said. Outlining the outcome of the interaction they had with President Kumaratunga, he said that attention was focused on three major aspects such as developing a better network of marketing, paying high prices for farmers and promotion of liquid milk. "We are deliberating to expand our presence in the North-West areas in future", he said. Cargills (Ceylon) Ltd operates the Cargills Food City Supermarket chain in Sri Lanka. They currently operate 37 outlets around the island and plan to expand and increase this number to 50. The Company also manages a leading Department Store as well as the Book City chain and bookstores. Cargills Commercial Division handles imports and an array of other goods and services. They operate a central warehouse, which distributes goods to all supermarkets. |
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