AU: New citrus packing shed for Sunraysia will be a world leader
The packing shed will cover almost 10,000 square metres and be capable of packing over 3 million cartons of citrus in a season. Greg McMahon is the managing director of Seven Fields and said "The packing shed has been primarily designed to handle the explosion of mandarins that will come into production in the Sunraysia region over the next few years. The special design features means it will be able to handle the softer citrus varieties, like mandarins, much more gently and with the proper treatments; and do it without compromising the speed and efficiency demanded by the modern marketplace. All other citrus varieties will be accommodated just as easily."
In designing the packing facility line, Seven Fields chose Allan Dean from Falcon Engineering (a New Zealand based business) to act as project manager. Falcon Engineering has been involved in the design and construction of a great many citrus, stone fruit and apple packing lines in Australia and New Zealand and it is particularly Falcon’s expertise in the soft citrus packing lines in Queensland that led Seven Fields to secure Allan Dean’s years of experience. Mr Dean said, "It’s an exciting project Seven Fields have embarked upon, and one that gives me the opportunity to bring together all of the aspects of efficient production lines with future-proof post-harvest treatment facilities that I have seen around the world and installed in Australasia."
Falcon Engineering was engaged to conduct an exhaustive global search for the contractor who will provide the packing equipment. This process concluded with the selection of MAF Agrobotic as the supplier. MAF is a company based in France, with its Australian subsidiary Colour Vision Systems in Victoria, Australia. MAF were chosen over other providers because of their superior offer of a completely integrated packing solution from the beginning of the line to the end, their extensive experience throughout the world in designing, installing and servicing packing lines and their extensive investment in ongoing research and development. Thomas Blanc a Director of MAF Agrobotic and said, "The Seven Fields project is very important for MAF Agrobotic as it gives us the opportunity to partner with a company that is looking for a complete solution for citrus packing in Australia that will showcase the sort of progressive thinking MAF has been advocating for some time in other parts of the world. The design we have developed with Seven Fields includes a two-stage packing line where fruit is pre-graded and pre-sized on one line, and then packed on the second line. Throughout the process there are multiple quality checks, and most importantly the two stage line permits greater flexibility in the orchard and a shorter time to deliver product to customers."
Seven Fields have been assisted with the new project with the offer of $500,000 assistance from the Victorian Government under the Victorian Business Flood Recovery Fund.
For more information:
Greg McMahon
Seven Fields
Tel: +61 0419 831 899