New market push for home-grown veg

Farmers in north-west Tasmania will become the 'poster boys' for a new vegetable marketing push promoting Australian grown produce.

The vegetable processor Simplot will label its Birds Eye frozen vegetables 'Grown in Australia' and feature pictures of Tasmanian farmers under the joint marketing venture with the industry.

Simplot in Tasmania will be the country's only producer of Australian-grown frozen vegetables, when its rival McCains closes its Smithton factory later this year.

Farmers have welcomed a new labelling campaign.

Fair Dinkim Food Campaigner Richard Bovill says clearer labelling will benefit both farmers and consumers.

"The public have been calling for clearer country-of-origin labelling for quite some time," he said.

"Birds Eye now are responding to that need and they are delivering exactly what the public have been asking for, and that is to be able to clearly identify where their food comes from.

The company's Terry O'Brien says research shows 97 per cent of Australians prefer locally grown vegetables.

But he says current labelling practices make it difficult for people to determine the country of origin.

The launch was attended by the leaders of Tasmania's three political parties.

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Fri 12th March 2010 - 09:17am