Ingham co-op plans continue

Since the company announced plans to close the turkey plant earlier this year, there have been a series of meetings attended by poultry producers, workers, interested parties from the National Union of Workers and state and local politicians to work out a way forward.

From these deliberations came the creation of the Fleurieu Poultry Association, a community owned poultry cooperative that aims to make a range of products for local and regional markets.

Adviser to the cooperative, Dr Tony Webb, said there was a meeting just before Christmas between the co-operative and PIRSA representatives to flesh out details of a feasibility study.

The study was flagged by Agriculture Minister Leon Bignell at a meeting at the McLaren Vale town hall in early December, where he pledged state government funding.

At the meeting, Mr Bignell said the study was likely to take between six and eight weeks to complete and that the plans could work out if there was enough supply and demand, and if the factory could process other poultry.

Dr Webb said the association had identified three consultants to work on the project, but did not want to disclose names at this stage.

"This is not going to be an easy process," he said.

"It might take six months to pull this together properly."

He was pleased with the feedback from Inghams.

"They're saying they're not adverse to discussions with us," Dr Webb said.

"But there are two conditions to us taking over the processing facility. One is that we don't process turkeys and two is that we don't expect it to be a joint venture. Everything else is up for negotiation.

"Even if someone else takes over the facility, there's nothing stopping a joint venture between whoever that might be and the cooperative."

Dr Webb said the turkey processing facility still needed a valuation.

The Fleurieu Poultry Association has won the support of a number of primary producers in the region including Wakefield Grange's Sophie and Nathen Wakefield, Wattle Flat, and Gum Park Beef's Trevor Paech, Victor Harbor.

Dr Webb said he was hopeful of some firm outcomes from the December 18 meeting.

"I'm hopeful that after this meeting we'll have a guaranteed figure of government funding, we have a time for commencement of the feasibility study and an agreement about what we're looking for in terms of a consultant to do the feasibility study," he said.

"We don't want a bunch of bean counters asking 'where's your business plan?'.

"We need someone who can understand what we're trying to do and work with us to develop different options so we end up with something that's feasible."