On February 28, 2022, the world changed for Lismore, but unfortunately in a devastatingly bad way.
The biggest flood in history caused chaos for everyone including dairy farmers, businesses and residents.
Almost everything was badly flooded and the devastation was heart breaking for all.
Seven months later things are far from normal still. Most houses are not inhabitable and most businesses are not operational.
In the middle of this sits Norco, a dairy cooperative and the biggest employer in the Lismore region. Their head office and ice cream factory were flooded like everything else in Lismore.
Seven months later their head office is getting closer to completion but the ice cream factory has been cleaned up and left dormant.
It was great news to hear this week that the ice cream factory will now be rebuilt thanks to $45.7m in funding from the federal government.
Without this funding it would not have been commercially viable to rebuild the ice cream factory and I thank Minister Watt for ensuring this rebuild will become a reality.
MORE IN OPINION:
The rebuild will allow many of the factories workers to remain employed and will help the rebuild in the devastated town of Lismore.
The ice cream factory will also be a positive for Norco in diversifying income streams and increase profits.
This should allow Norco to return extra money to its dairy farmer shareholders to drive further milk price increases to farmers.
It is very positive to see Norco investing in the northern NSW and Queensland dairy industries.
This will be a major manufacturing facility which is rare in the northern dairy industry.
The factory will utilise some excess milk in spring and create additional demand for milk when there is too much to meet fresh bottled milk requirements.
This is a big win for Lismore and dairy farmers which both need positive news after the devastating year they have both faced.
