JBS Australia has expanded its multi-million dollar partnership with Chinese company COFCO Meat Holdings at the recent China International Import Expo in Shanghai.
The deal with COFCO Meat Holdings, a state owned Chinese company in Beijing, was signed at by JBS Australia’s CEO Brent Eastwood at the expo and aims to reach 15,000MT of beef and $US100 million of trade over the next three years.
JBS Southern Beef Sales Domestic and Export Manager Robert Ryan said the MoU with COFCO Meat is an important step in building the customer relationship with the major Chinese business.
“COFCO is one of our most important customers in China and they have developed strong strategic sales channels for the various types of beef we produce in our business,” Ryan said.
“After working closely with COFCO over the last three years, we have increased our beef sales to COFCO Meat by 270 per cent in volume and increased our dollar value by 300 per cent to an estimated $37 million in 2018.”
Eastwood met with the President of the COFCO Group Patrick Yu as and the COFCO Meat Holdings Managing Director Jianong Xu at the event to discuss what the MoU meant for JBS Australia’s exports to China.
“It is crucial to have expanded chilled beef access in China, for our existing China approved plants. There are only 11 export establishments that are approved for chilled access from Australia, and JBS’ Dinmore site is one of these plants,” Eastwood said.
“The high end Chinese market requires the ability to deliver safe quality product to the Chinese consumer 52 weeks of the year.”
