Lakeland Dairies Begins €36 Million Expansion of Milk Powder Processing Operations
Irish dairy co-operative Lakeland Dairies is beginning a €36 million investment in an expansion of milk powder processing operations at its site at Bailieboro in County Cavan. The investment has been supported by the Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation through Enterprise Ireland.
The overall development will lead to the creation of 81 jobs across the Lakeland Dairies Group over a five year period. Up to 180 construction jobs will also be created by contractors during the building, installation and commissioning phases for the new processing facilities.
One of Ireland’s leading farmer owned dairy processing co-operatives, Lakeland Dairies processes over 800 million litres of farm produced milk annually into a wide range of value-added dairy foodservice products and food ingredients which it exports to over 70 countries worldwide.
Following the abolition of milk quotas later this year, annual milk supply to Lakeland Dairies is expected to increase by some 40% to over 1 billion litres by 2020. The development by Lakeland Dairies is designed to ensure that the co-operative is well positioned to take advantage of all future market opportunities for its milk producers.
The expansion will see the installation of a new 7 tonne per hour milk drying facility at Bailieboro where total milk powder production capacity will increase to 19 tonnes per hour. Lakeland currently produces 80,000 tonnes of milk powders a year and this will rise to 130,000 tonnes on completion of the project in 2016. The co-operative also produces 24,000 tonnes of butter on the same site which provides for considerable flexibility in milk throughput and overall economies of scale for the food ingredients business.
Michael Hanley, group chief executive of Lakeland Dairies, comments: “Growth in our global dairy ingredients business is being fuelled by consumer trends and developments in food industry sectors where we have access to key markets and customers throughout the world. Over the past five years we have transformed our processing capabilities and have also underpinned our future export potential with new global logistics facilities. The expansion of our operations at Bailieboro will create further advantages for our milk producers. In particular, we see continuing opportunity in the areas of infant formulae, dairy proteins and health related nutritional products, among other categories, where we are a globally recognised leading supplier of the highest quality milk powders.”
Lakeland Dairies has over 2,200 milk suppliers and operates across 15 counties in both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland exporting close to 100% of all milk processed as value added dairy foodservice products and food ingredients. Lakeland Dairies had annual revenues of €545.5 million in 2013 and currently employs 700 people.
CAPTION:
Richard Bruton, TD, Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation pictured with Michael Hanley (centre), group chief executive of Lakeland Dairies; chairman Alo Duffy (right); and Michael Cantwell (left), food division manager of Enterprise Ireland.
