Fonterra Cooperative Group News

The impact of drought in February, March and April on dairy farms was greater than Fonterra Cooperative Group anticipated, with milk collection down 0.5 percent in the first 11 months of the season.

The New Zealand Institute of Chartered Accountants has brought former Fonterra chief executive Craig Norgate on board to oversee a major merger between the organisation and its Aussie counterpart, the Institute of Chartered Accountants Australia.

Former Fonterra Cooperative Group chairman Henry van der Heyden will head up the board of national gateway Auckland International Airport after the annual meeting in October.

Dairy juggernaut Fonterra is proposing to axe 300 corporate jobs and sharemarket investors have lapped up the cost-carving move, driving up the share price over $8 in a response that surprised analysts.

Fonterra has announced plans to pilot a scheme designed to provide farmers with the opportunity to have "more certainty" in their milk price.

Farmer shareholders will have the opportunity to offer to sell the economic rights of up to 25 per cent of their minimum required shares to the Fonterra Shareholders' Fund.

Fonterra's top management table has changed with the appointment of a new head for the underperforming Australia business and the exit of senior executive Mark Wilson.

Fonterra CEO Theo Spierings said a new leadership team had now been confirmed for APMEA, effective June 1. It included a new Managing Director Australia, Judith Swales, who joins Fonterra after leading Heinz across Australasia and before that the Goodyear Dunlop Business in Australia.