'Success in Saudi Arabia' - A Jeddah based carton factory establishes a reference

The aseptic packaging process allows more delicate processing of foods, juices and dairy product, preserving their flavour and nutritional content. Although aseptic packaging generally costs more than traditional packaging, Dr. Khalid Madani general supervisor of the nutrition department Makkah region, Ministry of Health, the vice president for the Saudi society for food and nutrition, said, "There's a real safety advantage on top of the good taste," adding that "some customers are willing to pay nearly double."

Tetra Pak the inventors and brand leaders in aseptic packaging, in 2003 manufactured 122 packs for every man, woman and child in the Kingdom. It also had an outstandingly successful start to 2004 in Saudi Arabia. The Jeddah-based carton factory produced 603 million finished packages in a single line at one factory in one month.

The Jeddah team complemented this record by also establishing a new benchmark in terms of productivity with very low waste figures.

"This was a real team effort," said Roberto Valenzuela, factory director. " Every one in the factory played a role."

Within the Kingdom, there is a substantial growth in dairy, beverages and food (mostly tomato paste) products, reflecting the worldwide trend of dairy producers worldwide to take advantage of the increasing popularity of high-protein diets. Increasing new innovations in the dairy products with a value added are a result of the awareness of health and nutrition issues and life style.

The local market consumes one billion litres per year, a growth rate of between three and four percent per year maintained for the last six years. Tetra Pak has the ability to pace the local growth in population. The financial and production challenges are to generate capacity without major capital investment by building mostly on high utilization of their equipment and focused efficiency improvements. Saudi consumption of health products is half per capita of the European countries.

This gives the local market a big potential for growth as in Saudi Arabia fifty percent of the population are below the age of 20 and the population will double in number to reach 40 million by 2020.

In 2003, 55 percent of Jeddah factory production was for Saudi Arabia (the primary market), and 45 percent to the GCC and other countries in the Middle East, North Africa and some Asian countries.

Having achieved a record level of production, the team has forecasted that in 2004 the Saudi factory will export to 26 different countries and has set itself the target of producing over 7.2 billion cartons per annum by 2007.

Tetra Pak Saudi Arabia is part of Swedish Tetra Laval Group and has been present in Saudi since early 1950s.

Tetra Pak works for and with its customers to provide preferred processing and packaging solutions for food. We apply our commitment to innovation, our understanding of consumer needs and our relationships with suppliers to deliver these solutions, wherever and whenever food is consumed. Tetra Pak is committed to making food safe and available, everywhere.

Operating in more than 165 markets with 20,900 employees, Tetra Pak believes in responsible industry leadership, creating profitable growth in harmony with environmental sustainability and good corporate citizenship.