The Overseas Investment Office last week approved the sale of 100% of shares of Oceania Dairy Ltd to China-based Inner Mongolia Industrial Group Co Ltd, which intends to build a $214 million infant milk formula plant in the area.
Oceania Dairy Ltd managing director Paul Park said it was hoped construction of the plant, which could employ about 100 people, would start this month.
Although Mr Park said staffing levels ''had yet to be confirmed'', milk supplies for the plant, which could be operational by July 2014, would come from North Otago and South Canterbury farms within a 50km radius of Glenavy.
Waitaki MP Jacqui Dean said the decision was a ''thumbs-up'' for farmers and residents, and added that continued investment in irrigation in the region had given the area the potential to become a ''major player'' in the food production industry.
Waimate Mayor John Coles said the new plant would also mean spin-offs for the wider community.
''It's all very positive for us. It gives a certain amount of confidence to the farming sector, too, that there is an opportunity to supply a different factory. I guess the other end of the spectrum, too, it could create a little more incentive for people to be proactive in the dairy sector again - that flows through to new dairy sheds and new houses and new people living in your community.''
Consents for a new infant milk formula plant on the corner of Cooneys Rd and State Highway 1 have been in place for the past three years, and Glenavy Hotel publican Mervyn Hall said the whole township was ''very excited'' that the new plant could, at last, go ahead.''
Now it has been announced, the whole place is full of excitement. It will certainly be a big help for Glenavy.''
