Whey Protein Concentrate: a New Zealand Success Story
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1 WHEY TO GO 2 Whey to go WHEY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE: A NEW ZEALAND SUCCESS STORY Edited by John MacGibbon Authors: Robin Fenwick Jim Harper Peter Hobman Lee Huffman Ken Kirkpatrick John MacGibbon Kevin Marshall Mike Matthews Arthur Wilson Dave Woodhams MARTINBOROUGH 3 WHEY TO GO Ngaio Press PO Box 153, Martinborough 5741, New Zealand [email protected] • www.ngaiopress.com Copyright © Editor & contributors 2014 First published in 2014 This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under clause 96 of the Copyright Act 1994 (NZ), no part may be reproduced by any process without the permission of the publishers. National Library of New Zealand cataloguing-in-publication data: Whey to go : whey protein concentrate : a New Zealand success story / John MacGibbon, editor. ISBN 978-0-9864685-7-5 1. Whey. 2. Whey products—New Zealand—History. 3. Dairy products industry—New Zealand. I. MacGibbon, John, 1945- II. Title. 637.3—dc 23 The authors are grateful for financial assistance provided for production of this book by Dairy Division of the New Zealand Institute of Food Science & Technology; Foundation for Research, Science & Technology (now part of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE)); Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry New Zealand (now part of the Ministry of Primary Industry); Ministry of Research Science and Technology (now part of MBIE); New Zealand Trade and Enterprise; W J Harper. Trade marks of The Coca-Cola Company are used with permission. The Coca-Cola Company has had no authorial nor editorial input to this book, nor does it endorse the contents. 4 Dedicated to Ken Kirkpatrick 1940–2010 5 WHEY TO GO 6 CONTENTS Preface 9 Acknowledgements 11 Introduction 12 1 Setting the scene (Dave Woodhams) 17 2 Whey: challenge and opportunity (Dave Woodhams) 26 3 Excitement and setback: the Coca-Cola years (Kevin Marshall) 36 4 A new direction: Japan 1975-1982 (Mike Matthews) 68 5 Food science and technology to the rescue (Jim Harper) 95 6 Product development (Lee Huffman) 112 7 We need cash flow: marketing whey proteins (Robin Fenwick) 137 8 Coming of age: the Whey Corporation (John MacGibbon) 150 9 Non-WPC initiatives (Mike Matthews) 176 10 In retrospect: success factors (Peter Hobman, Kevin Marshall Mike Matthews) 185 Appendix I ~ Membrane filtration technology (Dave Woodhams) 200 Appendix II ~ Soluble whey protein at the NZ Lactose Company (Arthur Wilson) 218 Appendix III ~ The Dairy Board’s Letter 1099 227 Glossary and acronyms 245 Bibliography 255 Image credits 256 Index 257 MAPS: Drying locations for WPC retentate produced at the Waitakaruru ultrafiltration plant 55 WPC ultrafiltration plants installed in NZ to 2001 174 7 WHEY TO GO 8 PREFACE n 1995 Ken Kirkpatrick was awarded the J C Andrews Award, Ithe New Zealand Institute of Food Science and Technology’s most prestigious award, for a substantial contribution to science and technology and leadership in the food industry. In his acceptance address Kirkpatrick reflected on the future directions for food technology in New Zealand. He expressed pride at having “the great good fortune at the start of my career to be in on the ground floor of the application of a new technology, namely ultrafiltration, and have been given the opportunity to follow it through the various stages of its commercialisation over the succeeding 20 years.” Eleven years later, one of the chapter authors, Kevin Marshall, received the same award.* He devoted his address to innovation in the New Zealand dairy industry, using the story of whey protein concentrate and ultrafiltration development in the 1960s and 70s as his case study. Whey protein concentrate, or WPC as it is generally known, is a soluble form of whey protein used in a variety of foods and beverages including cakes, protein shakes, sports drinks, infant formula and processed meats. In preparing his address Marshall sought the help of Kirkpatrick, Dave Woodhams and Jim Harper – all contributors to this book. At the end of June 2006, Marshall, in an email to Woodhams and Harper, wrote “Ken [Kirkpatrick] and I believe we should try to put together a more comprehensive and fully researched version of the history and we will try to advance that when Jim Harper is here early *Two other authors of this book were awarded the J C Andrews Award: Arthur Wilson (1997) and Mike Matthews (2008). 9 WHEY TO GO in the new year.” Kirkpatrick repeated the idea in an e-mail a few days later to Bill Eykamp, an American colleague, adding “to write a more complete history while we still have our marbles and most of the players are still alive.” Later that year a meeting of Don King, Kirkpatrick, Marshall and Woodhams agreed that a book would be attempted. A further meeting with a wider group in March 2007 mapped out the contents of the proposed book. This was refined in February 2009, after which Kirkpatrick wrote an introduction, which appears opposite. It would take another 18 months to obtain sponsorship for editing and publishing the book. The project has been a labour of love for the authors ever since, with enthusiasm waxing and waning, and now waxing again. Tragically, Ken Kirkpatrick did not survive to see the book completed. He died of a brain tumour in September 2010. Whey to Go has been written as a series of chapters by people who were major players in the development of whey protein concentrate products. An exception to this is the editor’s chapter on the Whey Corporation, which is based on archival research plus several interviews – particularly with Ken Kirkpatrick, who would otherwise have written the chapter. The authors hope that the story and insights will be valuable to all involved in process and product development: scientists, technologists, processors, marketers, policy makers and investors. While the chapters are broadly chronological, there are a few overlaps, both in timing and in information given. We have tried to keep this to a minimum, but some overlaps are inevitable, given the shared knowledge and experiences of the authors and the fact that similar information or activity might illuminate more than one aspect of the WPC story. In places, numbers appear after ‘WPC’, e.g. WPC 75. The number refers to the protein content. In this example the content would be at least 75 percent. 10 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This book was produced by far more than the chapter authors. We consulted widely and received contributions and comments from a host of colleagues. Some remain anonymous while some have their names on sidebar items within chapters. We are indebted to you all: Tony Baucke, John Begg, John Bell, Rod Bennett, Mal Beniston, Graham Calvert, Gavin Cherrie, Tom Connell, Gerald Crawford, Barry Dixon, Dick and Mary Earle, Bill Eykamp, Bill and Phoebe Falconer, Tony Fayerman, R Fenton-May, Andrew Fletcher, Anne Goldman, Murray Gough, Howard Heap, Conrad Heron, Sheelagh Hewitt, Jeremy Hill, Bernie Horton, Mike Howell, Jeff Jackson, Garry Johns, Don King, Phillip Kirk, Stuart Leiderman, Alex Malaspina, Neville Martin, Wilson McGillivray, Bruce Millar, Graeme Milne, Ken Morison, George Murphy, Birger Nordmark, John North, James Ogden, Dave Packer, Max Parkin, Lindsay Pearce, Peter Robertson, Mike Rockell, Gill Rodley, Ron Russell, Roger Ryan, Wayne Sanderson, Lynne Scanlen, Terry Spencer, Dryden Spring, Terry Thomas, Charlie Towler, Merv Whitehead, John Whitelock, John Wood. We are also grateful to Fonterra Research Centre, Palmerston North, for providing access to records and photos. While we wrote many of the documents we referred to, access was most helpful in correcting defective memories and filling in gaps in our knowledge of the people and events which contributed to this saga. 11 WHEY TO GO INTRODUCTION KEN KIRKPATRICK Ken Kirkpatrick he dairy industry in New Zealand is now and has been for attended Canterbury Tmany decades, a major part of the economy, comprising about University, completing 26 percent of total merchandise export revenue and three percent of a PhD in chemical engineering. He joined GDP. It is an industrial enterprise with about 95 percent of production NZDRI in 1967 and exported, mainly in the form of high quality industrial food and later headed the whey ingredient products with increasing quantities of consumer products, products section before to all corners of the earth. About 35 percent of all milk products traded moving to the New internationally come from New Zealand, a remote country in the South Zealand Dairy Board’s Chicago office in a Pacific Ocean. technical marketing The industry has long been driven, largely by competition in the role. On his return he marketplace from subsidised export of surpluses from Northern headed the Board’s Hemisphere countries, to be extremely cost-efficient through the whole protein division, then value chain from farm to customer. This relentless drive for efficiency became founding CE of the Whey Corporation. has led to the development and deployment of new sciences and He later had positions technologies on farms, in factories and in the distribution system. The at Massey University, New Zealand whey protein story is a part of that continuum. the Foundation for From very small beginnings in the 1960s and 70s, the whey protein Research Science and industry grew to be a substantial and highly sophisticated business Technology and the Department of Prime that over the years, directly and indirectly, has earned many billions Minister and Cabinet. of dollars for New Zealand. It continues to deliver income and new market opportunities on a considerable scale. New raw materials using new processing technologies were developed to create completely new products for new food applications in new markets. Had we had any inkling at the outset of the challenges involved, it is unlikely we would have started down this path.