NZ Innovators Awards for Oritain Global Ltd

For Immediate Release

NZ Innovators Awards for Oritain Global Ltd

7 November 2012

Dunedin based Oritain Global recently won the NZ Innovators Awards for Innovation in Hospitality, Food and Beverage. Judges commented on the company’s ability to ‘fingerprint’ the world’s food supply, providing certainty of origin and restoring people's trust in food.

Oritain Director, Grant Cochrane believes the service they offer is relevant to all producers.

“We’re protecting our primary industries against food fraud. We use an ‘origin’ based system, to identify the geochemistry of the environment and determine origin specifications for meat, orchard fruits, vegetables, honey, wine and dairy products”.

Oritain collects baseline data and conducts analysis to certify the product. The company then audits the production process and supply chain to ensure origin claims remain true from producer to fork. Oritain is very clear that theirs is not a traceability system, it is an origin system, certifying the geographic location of the product, not the journey of the product from origin to consumption.

The OECD estimates that food fraud costs legitimate producers around US$250 billion every year. It is for this reason that business is booming for Oritain. Cochrane is adamant that both producers and governments need to be more proactive in protecting their primary industries and their national brands.

“There’s a lot of deception going on and we keep finding our produce – or what’s described as our produce – being sold in boxes all over China” he says.

Mr Cochrane is passionate about helping to protect the integrity of ‘brand New Zealand’. A former international commodities trader, he is also currently standing for the Fonterra Board of Directors.

ENDS

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