‘Show of confidence’: Western Meat Packers and Coles unveil $35m upgrade to Bibra Lake packing facility

Western Meat Packers Group and Coles have unveiled a $35 million upgrade of their joint venture boning and packaging facility at Bibra Lake in a move aimed at turbocharging pork, lamb and beef supply across the State. The Bibra Lake facility — which supplies retail-ready, chilled raw meat products to every Coles store in WA — opened in 2011 and is a joint venture between Western Meat Packers Group entity MAP WA and Coles. The $35m upgrade will double the facility’s capacity to 2.1 million packs of retail-ready beef, lamb and pork per week for Coles stores in WA and the NT. About 80 jobs have been created through the upgrade, which involved $25 m worth of what WMP chief executive Andrew Fuda called “state-of-the-art robotics”. It also included the installation of Modified Atmosphere Packaging technology to maintain products’ visual, textural and nutritional elements for twice as long as normal packaging. MAP WA has also increased its production lines from six to nine, increasing capacity to 400,000kg, and production space from 2085sqm to 30sqm. Mr Fuda said the upgrades put the facility among the best in the world and showed the commitment by Coles and MAP WA to invest in the State’s agricultural supply chain. “We would be up there with the best processing facilities in Australia … and some of the best in the world for our streamlined processing,” he said. “We have been lucky with the support through Coles to be able to showcase these machines and have that technology and infrastructure here to produce for consumers.” The upgrade comes as other WA meat processors continue to struggle with labour shortages, and storage and throughput issues with processing lag times of up to three months. Minerva Foods’ Shark Lake Abattoir near Esperance closed indefinitely this month, leaving farmers already facing depressed livestock prices wondering what to do with 60,000 lambs. Mr Fuda said the upgrade would enable MAP WA and Coles to process and put more products on the shelves, “fresher, faster and at better value”. Asked what impact the upgrades would have on WA farmers, Mr Fuda said Coles had already bolstered its orders for pork, lamb and beef. “There has been an increase (in supply) … I can see that flowing through with the numbers we are producing,” he said. But Mr Fuda would not be drawn on whether the upgrade would make for better prices paid to farmers or cheaper products for consumers. “That’s a question for Coles … we have been able to do is to provide better packaging, better yield, better processing efficiencies to reduce those processing costs,” he said. Starting off with a small boning room in 1983, Western Meat Packers Group sources WA livestock before processing and packing products for domestic and international markets. It is still family-owned, with directors Rod and Shana Russell knocking back several takeover bids in the past decade. WA Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis said MAP WA and Coles’ investment was “great news” for the State’s meat industry and showed how partnerships could create new markets and job opportunities. Western Meat Packers’ operations also include abattoirs at Bunbury and Margaret River, a farm at Brunswick, a cold store facility and retail store at Osborne Park, skin and hide processing plants in Picton and Coogee, and an export office in South Korea.