MHD NEWS
Freight industry on board for airport opportunity
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en of Australia’s major freight companies have entered a memoranda of understanding (MOUs) with Western Sydney Airport. The MOUs will see Western Sydney Airport work with the air freight industry to design concepts for an on-airport freight precinct and begin discussions about potential operations from Sydney’s new airport. Western Sydney Airport CEO Graham Millett said Western Sydney International (Nancy-Bird Walton) Airport has the potential to become Sydney’s most important freight hub, generating many of the Airport’s thousands of jobs. “The Airport’s unrestricted 24/7 operations will be the key to unlocking new export opportunities for businesses and producers across Western Sydney and NSW,” he said. “Goods produced in NSW will no longer have to be trucked to Brisbane or
Melbourne in order to reach lucrative Asian markets overnight.” Freight companies signing up to work with Western Sydney Airport on concepts for the air freight hub include
Australia Post (including StarTrack), DB Schenker, DHL Express, DSV Air and Sea, FedEx, Menzies Aviation, Swissport, Qantas Freight, Skyroad Logistics and Wymap.
Freight companies signing up to work with the airport include Australia Post, FedEx and Qantas Freight.
Woolworths breaks ground on new $135m distribution centre
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oolworths has commenced building works on the supermarket’s new Melbourne Fresh Distribution Centre (MFDC) in Truganina, Victoria. The multi-million state-of-the-art facility, which will be built by Vaughan Constructions, will store and deliver fresh produce and chilled products to hundreds of Victorian supermarkets, create 200 jobs during construction and 300 permanent new jobs when it opens in late-2020. The custom-designed facility will replace Woolworths current operations at Mulgrave, and provide the leading national retailer with a market edge in terms of supply chain dynamics. The MFDC will be co-located with Woolworths’ meat supplier Hilton 8 | MHD SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2019
Meats’ production facility. Co-location with Hilton and closer proximity to more fresh food suppliers
The new site will store and deliver fresh produce to supermarkets across Victoria.
will take up to 600 trucks off the West Gate Bridge each week and a further 3,000 truck movements off Melbourne roads each year. “This development will help us deliver top quality fruit and vegetables to our customers fresher, faster and more efficiently than ever before. At one-and-a-half times the size of the MCG field, the distribution centre will provide a significant uplift in capacity to support our continued growth in Victoria. We’re proud to be investing in a best-in-class supply chain network in Victoria – delivering fresher food to our customers, taking trucks off Melbourne’s roads, and creating hundreds of new jobs,” Woolworths Chief Supply Chain Officer Paul Graham said.
