SunRice awarded gold for international success

The SunRice Group has taken home gold, winning the Agribusiness, Food and Beverages Award at the 61st Australian Export Awards.

Held at Parliament House, the award recognises outstanding international success in the field of agricultural products, including manufactured foods and beverages.

The SunRice Group was founded over 70 years ago when a group of Riverina rice growers pooled their resources to build a single rice mill in the 1950s. Today, the company is a $1.6bn ASX-listed FMCG company selling more than 1500 products, under 35 major brands, into over 50 countries.

Paul Serra, SunRice Group CEO, said, “As a global FMCG business and one of Australia’s leading value-added food exporters with a 70+ year heritage, our success is underpinned by our great people, our farmers who are amongst the best rice growers in the world, our valued customers and our ongoing commitment to research and development to maintain Australia’s global reputation as a leader in rice products.

“Although the federal government’s recent legislation reintroducing water buybacks will present new challenges for our industry to remain globally competitive, we hope to be an exporter of premium rice products around the world for many years to come,” Serra said.

The Group’s global reputation and multi-market strategy allows it to source paddy rice from 12 different countries, including Australia. According to Serra, this helps the SunRice Group to satisfy global demand for its products and manage climate variability.

In financial year 2023, SunRice leveraged strong Australian rice crops to target opportunities in drought-affected markets like the US and Europe. It also re-entered premium rice tender markets in Asia, including Japan and Korea.

“The resulting strong performance meant that Australian rice growers were paid a record naturally determined paddy price last year. This historic record is testament to the strength and provenance of the SunRice brand and the strong sales volumes achieved in premium destination markets,” Serra said.

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