Livestock processing facility to be built in South Australia

CirPro (Australia), formerly Pirie Meats, and Siemens have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) that outlines ways in which the two companies will cooperate in CirPro’s design, development and implementation of a livestock processing facility in Port Pirie. Siemens is set to provide technological and infrastructural solutions that will assist in developing the facility with Industry 4.0 in mind.

“This MoU with Siemens means that we have access to knowledge across the broadest spectrum of technology with a single technology company. What I really want out of this is to develop a view of what’s possible — and I can’t think of another company that could deliver the breadth and depth of knowledge and technology offerings that Siemens can,” said CirPro CEO Reg Smyth.

“Embracing Industry 4.0 is critical as we prepare our competitive place in the world. But when it comes to business, what’s most important is the objectives such as speed, resource efficiency, flexible production, scalability, sustainability and so on. This is what drives competitiveness. When you look at this holistically against the technology solutions available today in digitalisation, automation and energy efficiency, you can achieve amazing outcomes. However, to really achieve maximum efficiency you need to include all aspects of the business end to end — everything from interactions with your supply chain to cybersecurity, smart building technologies and even types of skills needed to operate the plant,” explained Jeff Connolly, CEO of Siemens Australia.

CirPro has committed to a circular processing model and the aims to reduce methane emissions from livestock with a seaweed diet supplement, hence the change of name from Pirie Meats.

“Embracing Australian innovation and advanced plant technologies from Siemens in this way is exciting, but will present challenges and require collective commitments to support an industry transformation that will create new market opportunities for Australian products, greater resilience and increased returns to farmers through to value-add product manufacturers. Siemens support for comprehensive digitalisation and traceability across this new supply chain will be fundamental to informing and protecting the quality, integrity, value and future growth of all products that come through our new facility,” Smyth said.

Subject to detailed design completion and final Development Approval, CirPro is focused on commencing construction as soon as possible with processing commencing by early 2023.