Wattle Health's Organic closer to exporting infant formula to China
Dairy market: Lazarus Karasavvidis says Blend and Pack’s CNCA licence approval by China is significant for Wattle Health.
EVIDENCE is emerging that China is inching towards opening up its dairy market to direct imports of infant formula from Australia after a gap of more than a year.
In the past week, at least two Australian companies have had their infant formula packing plants receive accreditation renewals from the Certification and Accreditation Administration of the People’s Republic of China (CNCA).
China changed its dairy import rules from January 1 last year to require Chinese-labelled infant formula sold in retail stores to be manufactured at a CNCA registered plant, plus have its quality assured through an accreditation process run by the new State Administration of Market Regulation.
But for the past year, no accreditation had been granted.
In the past week, Blend and Pack Limited and Camperdown Powder Pty Ltd have received CNCA licences for their Hallam and Braeside plants, respectively.
Blend and Pack cans infant formula for Wattle Health Australia, which owns 5 per cent of the packer.
Camperdown Powder is 90 per cent owned by Bellamy’s Organic.
Bellamy’s Organic bought the packer in 2017 in anticipation of the new Chinese regulatory rules for Chinese-labelled infant formula.
Both Wattle Health and Bellamy’s Organic are awaiting the separate process of accreditation from China’s SAMR.
Wattle Health Australia executive chairman Lazarus Karasavvidis said dairy manufacturers must have their products made in CNCA registered facilities before they could receive SAMR accreditation.
“No one in the globe has been allowed to export unless they had SAMR approval,” Mr Karasavvidis said. “This (CNCA licence renewal) is quite significant for us.”
Bellamy’s Organic said Camperdown Powder’s CNCA licence for its Braeside plant was due to expire in July this year, but had now been extended until December 31.
“Bellamy’s continues to sell English-label product through cross-border e-comm platforms — for example, through Tmall Global and Kaola — and daigou (shoppers visiting Australia) continue to purchase formula in Australia and send parcels back to China,” a spokesman said.
“Prior to January 1, 2018, Bellamy’s imported Chinese-label product into China for sale in both offline and online channels.
“The company has not imported any Chinese-label product into China since new regulations came into effect on January 1, 2018, but it has continued sales with stock that was built up prior to January 1, 2018.
“Bellamy’s is waiting for SAMR product registration before it can import additional product.”
