More transparency from Fonterra

The Commerce Commission wants more transparency from Fonterra Cooperative Group, saying the dairy processor hasn’t met its commitments to be more forthcoming. The regulator reviews the milk price manual at the start of each season to make sure Fonterra is calculating its farmgate milk price in line with the regulatory regime. The final report on the latest season’s manual gave the dairy processor a “pass” mark, saying there were no major concerns over the latest amendments. However, the commission said it will take a closer look at Fonterra’s disclosure of sales outside the GlobalDairyTrade platform, which rival processors complained about during the submission process. The report said Fonterra hasn’t consistently met its commitment to publish quarterly forecasts of the cents per kilogram of milk solids impact from including off-GDT sales of whole milk powder, skim milk powder and anhydrous milk fat in the milk price calculation.