Name Announcement Creates Challenge

New Zealand’s biggest company will be called Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd, its Chairman, John Roadley, announced today.

“A new name will initially mean little to shareholders, staff and the wider public,” Mr Roadley said. “Our challenge is to ensure Fonterra means something special to our shareholders, our staff and all New Zealanders within our first year.”

Mr Roadley said the process to develop the name took several months, was led by the board, and involved a small group of shareholders, industry executives, designers and lawyers. Care had to be taken that the name was not offensive in any language or already prominently in use internationally.

“At the end of that process, the board saw Fonterra as being associated with natural purity and the quality of products that flow from our land, while Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd tells the world that we are a co-operative and proud of it,” Mr Roadley said.

“Within our first year, our goal is for our shareholders, sharemilkers and their families to associate Fonterra with outstanding service and performance. We want our staff to associate it with a place that they can excel and we want Fonterra to be where New Zealand’s top talent aspires to work. We want all New Zealanders to associate Fonterra with excellence in every respect.”

Fonterra Co-operative Group Ltd, with over NZ$11 billion in assets, will operate in 120 countries, employ 20,000 people, earn over 20 percent of New Zealand’s export receipts and generate seven percent of its GDP. It will be formed as a result of the merger between New Zealand Dairy Group and Kiwi Co-operative Dairies, incorporating the assets of the New Zealand Dairy Board.

The company will have two key operating units, NZMP and NEW ZEALAND MILK, and a small Corporate Centre based at Auckland International Airport.

NZMP will become responsible for the entire cow-to-customer value chain, including milk collection, manufacturing and logistics operations and the marketing of quality ingredients to customers around the world. Transportation and manufacturing functions currently carried out by New Zealand Dairy Group and Kiwi Co-operative Dairies will be part of NZMP, and the NZMP name will appear on trucks and factories.

NEW ZEALAND MILK will be Fonterra’s fast-moving global consumer goods company marketing a full range of health products, derived from milk. As well as its existing businesses throughout the world, it will own Australasian Food Holdings Ltd, which includes Mainland and Peters & Brownes. Its companies will continue to trade under their own names.

END

nb Fonterra owes its origins to Latin. fon means ‘fountain’ or ‘spring’ and denotes ‘flowing’. terra means ‘earth’ or ‘land’.

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