China’s beverage giant keen on sugar production, mining

Manila Times
BY BEN ARNOLD O. DE VERA REPORTER
CHINA’S largest beverage maker is eyeing investments in sugar production and mining in the Philippines, the Board of Investments (BOI) said. Cristino Panlilio, BOI managing head, told reporters that Hangzhou Wahaha Group Co. Ltd. is considering joint ventures with Filipino businesses that could provide up to 6,000 hectares of idle sugar plantations, especially in Pampanga and Tarlac.

Panlilio said Wahaha consumes about 300,000 tons of sugar a year for the production of its beverage and dairy products. 

Wahaha could infuse P1 billion into this venture, the BOI official said, as “capital is not a problem” for the Chinese firm.

The Wahaha Group is controlled by Zong Qinghou—whom Forbes magazine this year named as China’s richest man.

According to its website, Wahaha is China’s biggest beverage company, with 150 subsidiaries in 29 provinces in the mainland and 58 production bases. The group produces drinking water, juice drinks, milk drinks, tea drinks, canned food, healthcare food, among others.

Panlilio met with Zong during a visit to China last week. “Wahaha is bullish on the Philippines. It is just waiting for the [Aquino] government to settle down and get itself organized,” the BOI official said.

“Wahaha is also looking for the right partners,” he said.

He said the BOI could set up Wahaha with the Escaler family’s Sweet Crystals Integrated Sugar Mills Corp., as well as the Central Azucarera de Tarlac.

The Department of Trade and Industry earlier said that Wahaha is mulling over tapping the Philippines as a manufacturing site, with Filipino-Chinese businessman Carlos Chan, who owns the Oishi line of food products, as its potential partner. The homegrown Oishi brand is famous in China.