Figures obtained by Critic Te Arohi show the Uni spent almost $750k on milk and dairy products in 2021.
Peer into almost any fridge in Uni and you’ll see it: bottle after bottle of Meadow Fresh milk. From hall breakfasts and morning coffees to office tearooms, the white stuff seems to be an unavoidable presence across campus. One student told Critic Te Arohi that their office alone has an average of 20-30L of milk in the fridge week to week, stocked up like a dairy-farming doomsday-prepper’s wet dream. But it turns out that these rivers of tearoom milk only form the tip of a very, very large iceberg.
According to the Uni’s Procurement Manager, Stephen Hall, a total of $740,170.24 was spent on purchasing milk and dairy products in 2021. This figure includes “residential college catering, food outlets on campus, catering for events, and providing milk for staff tea and coffee”.
Anyone familiar with the dairy aisle will know Meadow Fresh milk sits on the bougie side compared to the humble Value or Homebrand stuff. A 2L bottle goes for $5 at Countdown, compared to $3.90 for Homebrand or even cheaper at stores like Yogiji’s. But a price list obtained by Critic Te Arohi suggests the Uni aren’t really paying a premium for the brand – which makes sense, since it’s largely the same milk bottled in the same factories by the same companies. While the figures vary by brand, it looks like the Uni generally gets a solid 30-50% discount compared to supermarket prices. Must be nice.
All that sweet, sweet dairy cash goes to Goodman Fielder, an Australian food conglomerate who is contracted to supply the Uni’s milk and dairy needs. They dominate Aotearoa’s grocery aisles as the owners of Meadow Fresh, Chelsea Sugar, Edmonds, Irvines, Nature’s Fresh, Vogel’s and many other brands besides.
They are, in turn, owned by Wilmar International: a Singapore-based food-processing behemoth who is one of the largest producers of sugar and palm oil in the world. Wilmar raked in $75 billion last year, with CEO Kuok Khoon Hong receiving a cool $17 million pay cheque. To put it another way, the $750k the Uni spent on their products last year would’ve paid his salary for 2 weeks.