Danish dairy co-operative Arla has announced it will close its dairy facility in Brabrand, Denmark in 2019 and move production to other facilities.
The Brabrand facility produces a range of products such as yogurt, skyr and crème fraîche, and production of these products will be moved to the company’s dairies in Slagelse and Hobro in future.
The dairy also produces a range of smaller products which require special packaging, and production of these items will be moved to the company’s facilities in the Netherlands and Germany.
Arla says the decision will allow the brand to secure “uniform quality” for its fermented milk products and secure future production capacity, as production at the Brabrand facility could not be expanded.
Jakob Bernhard Knudsen, senior vice president and head of Arla Danmark said: “European consumers are buying more and more yogurt products, and we need to look at how we can secure future production capacity and ensure yoghurt products of a high quality across the European countries.
“As we cannot expand production at Brabrand Dairy because of the location and costs of production equipment, we are moving production to competence centres at primarily Danish, Dutch and German production sites.”
Knudsen added: “The aim is to create production sites that are experts within the individual products, both in terms of production and development.”
Arla has informed the 160 members of staff at the Brabrand site of the closure, and the brand will cooperate with trade unions to “ensure the employees are given good terms” once the factory closes.
Knudsen said: “It is important to us that we help the employees at Brabrand Dairy move on in a good way, either to jobs at other Arla production sites or outside Arla.
“And I am pleased that we can maintain and develop more jobs at the Danish production sites, which will take over production from Brabrand Dairy.”
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