In August 2008, we announced that to secure the future of our New Zealand chocolate manufacturing operations, we would be investing NZ$51 million to upgrade and modernise the equipment at our Cadbury Dunedin factory.
This upgrade is critical to ensure Dunedin is a viable and essential chocolate making factory for Cadbury. It will see Dunedin become a specialist centre for the manufacture of boxed chocolate assortments such as Roses, Continental and Milk Tray as well as bars such as Buzz Bar, Chocolate Fish, Pinky and sugar panned products such as Jaffas and Pebbles.
This is in addition to a NZ$20 million investment at Dunedin to create a specialist centre for chocolate crumb – the base ingredient in Cadbury Dairy Milk milk chocolate that is used in New Zealand and Australian chocolate and is also being exported to South East Asia.
The factory upgrade is well under way and is on track to be completed by the end of this year. At this time, the Dunedin factory will export around 80% of what it makes including all of the boxed chocolates for the New Zealand and Australian markets.
At the time that we announced the upgrade of the Dunedin factory, we indicated approximately 145 roles would no longer be required at the site. This is largely due to the introduction of new automated equipment that is improving the speed and the technical processes we use to make our chocolates.
As a result of these changes, in March lastyear, 71 confectioners left the business after voluntarily requesting redundancy.
On August 13 2009, under the second phase of these changes, we have re-confirmed to our confectioner, supervisor and on-site trades employees who requested a voluntary redundancy or did not want to be redeployed that their request has been approved.
As a result, 71 people across our confectioner, supervisor and on-site trades roles will leave progressively between later this month (August 2009) and August 2010, depending upon equipment changeover timelines. The majority of our confectioners who took a voluntary redundancy left the business towards the end of November last year.
This is a sad time for the team at Dunedin as no-one ever wants to see their colleagues and friends leave. We have worked very hard to ensure the redundancy process has been fair and that our people have been informed of these changes every step of the way. We want our people to be as comfortable as possible about what is a very big change in their lives so it is important they have the information and support to be able to make informed choices about what is right for them and their family’s future.
Everyone who put their hand up for a voluntary redundancy received one. Our employees who are leaving us will receive their full entitlements and will also receive free financial and careers counselling to help them make decisions about their future beyond Cadbury.
We thank our people for their patience during this unsettling time, and we wish them well for the future. For those employees continuing with Cadbury Dunedin, we look forward to continuing to transform the Dunedin site into a better place to work and a first class chocolate manufacturing centre of excellence.