Prime Minister John Key officially opened North Island Mussel Processor\u2019s (NIMPL\u2019s) new factory which contains the world\u2019s first automated mussel opening (AMO) machines.<\/p>\n
NIMPL director Peter Vitasovich said the company\u2019s new state-of-the-art Greenshell mussel processing plant will see export manufacturing capacity increase nearly three-fold thanks to the new AMO technology.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur new Tauranga factory houses 28 automated mussel opening (AMO) machines that each process up to 3,600 mussels per hour \u2013 that\u2019s more than 1.6 million mussels per 16-hour day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen fully operational, NIMPL will boast the world\u2019s largest capacity for half-shell production,\u201d said Vitasovich.<\/p>\n
NIMPL chairman Geoff Burgess described the joint venture as an innovative model for export cooperation and rationalisation, saying NIMPL will contribute to the industry\u2019s ambitious plan of making New Zealand\u2019s aquaculture sector a sustainable billion dollar industry by 2025 \u2013 a plan that has the full support of the government.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur ability to process this raw product in such high volumes at a lower cost base will increase New Zealand\u2019s competitiveness in overseas markets and help build a sustainable model for the future,\u201d said Burgess.<\/p>\n
Currently NIMPL\u2019s existing factory operates with manual mussel openers \u2013 this factory will now redirect its focus on delivering value-added mussel products.<\/p>\n
NIMPL is one of Tauranga\u2019s largest employers, with a total of approximately 220 staff \u2013 35 being permanent and the balance of 185 being seasonal staff. A further 200 seasonal staff were contracted during the transitional phase to begin processing in the new AMO factory.<\/p>\n
Greenshell mussels are a species unique to New Zealand waters.<\/p>\n
Aquaculture accounts for approximately 20% of the value of New Zealand\u2019s total fisheries production, with Greenshell mussels being the greatest contributor to the growth of this industry.<\/p>\n
Greenshell mussels represent 77% of the New Zealand aquaculture sector, which is worth more than NZD 300 million (\u20ac172.7 million\/$214.3 million)<\/p>\n
NIMPL is an equal joint venture between Sanford Ltd, Sealord Group Ltd and Greenshell New Zealand Ltd and tasked with developing a low-cost, high-volume mussel processing facility.<\/p>\n
It is a toll processor in that the company doesn\u2019t own the product, but adds value to a raw material for its shareholders who export Greenshell mussels around the world to markets such as the US, Asia, Europe and the Middle East.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A NZD 23 million (\u20ac13.2 million\/$16.4 million) mussel processing facility which will help provide the world\u2019s largest half-shell production capacity has opened in Tauranga, New Zealand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3349,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-3348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-industry-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3348"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3348\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3350,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3348\/revisions\/3350"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3348"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=3348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}