Our CEO Amanda Bardwell spoke at The Australian’s Global Food Forum today, which had a strong focus on supply chain resilience, natural disasters and what we’re hearing from our customers.
Read below to learn more about the role we all play in national food security in Amanda’s opinion piece, which was published in The Australian on 17 March, and includes some of the information she shared at the Global Food Forum.
"Throughout my 25-year career in retail, starting on the shop floor in Queensland, I’ve seen how supermarkets are the front door to a much larger national food system. We connect communities to world-class Australian produce every single day, but we know we can’t be the Fresh Food People without partnering with our country’s best farmers and growers.
Fresh food starts in the orchard or the paddock and is absolutely dependent on innovation from farmers and a resilient supply chain. This matters a great deal to us, as we buy around 20% of fresh produce grown in Australia and process around 10% of the nation's weekly beef.
Delivering at that scale means building trusted relationships with around 2,400 meat and fruit and vegetable suppliers. A lot has been said recently about these relationships, particularly following the ACCC Inquiry, and we understand trust must be earned through action.
That’s why our teams made over 2,000 farm visits last year to understand the realities on the ground. During these visits, we’ve also seen some incredible innovations firsthand - like third-generation apple grower Scott Montague using MRI technology to guarantee internal fruit quality.
We’re listening to our suppliers and backing these conversations with actions - such as our 7- to-14-day payment terms for small suppliers to improve cash flow, and flexibility in product specifications to help growers bring imperfect produce to market during extreme weather.
We’re also investing in new ordering systems to give growers greater certainty. And to tackle broader, complex issues together, we’re proposing that Hort Innovation publish aggregated wholesale pricing data to provide transparency across the entire industry.
Food security at the farm gate is the start of the story. But the logistics of getting the food to customers are incredible. Australia has a unique scale and geography - and Woolworths alone moves 30 million cartons every week across our supply chain.
When floods, fires and cyclones sever road access, keeping communities connected to essential food becomes incredibly difficult. With so much of our nation's produce concentrated in key growing regions, disruptions can span right across the country."
