Tomato sauce comes back home to Hastings
Date: 4 Jan 2012
Wattie's tomato sauce is as Kiwi as a pavlova, except that the bottled version has been made in Australia for the past decade.
But soon, the "Made in Australia" tag in tiny writing on the top of the plastic squeeze bottle will change to "Made in New Zealand".
US food giant Heinz Wattie has closed down its Girgarre tomato sauce factory in the Goulburn Valley in northern Victoria with the loss of 146 jobs, and is bringing production back to the original Wattie's home in Hastings.
Heinz Wattie moved production of tomato sauce in plastic bottles to Australia in 2000.
Heinz, with global sales of US$10.7 billion a year, bought Wattie's 20 years ago for about US$300m. Production of tomato sauce was being brought back to New Zealand for "economies of scale" at a bigger factory in Hastings than the one in Victoria, a company spokesman said yesterday.
Production of beetroot, sauce toppings and some canned meals is also being moved across the Tasman to Hawke's Bay.
Though there will be a new production line for the plastic sauce bottles at the Hastings plant, the Heinz Wattie spokesman could not put a figure on just how many new jobs would be created.
Last year, Heinz Wattie regional chief executive Nigel Comer said "while a small number of new positions will be created, the Hastings facilities have the infrastructure to absorb the additional volumes into current operations."
The move would add 30,000 tonnes to the Hastings factory's output, an increase of between 10 and 15 per cent.
The Hastings factory, which already employs 500 fulltime and 800 seasonal workers, will supply Heinz and Wattie's tomato sauces for both New Zealand and Australian markets.
Tomato paste from California and Portugal will be used in making tomato sauce in New Zealand, as it has been in Australia.
More at www.stuff.co.nz
