Workers clock up long service for company

Workers in Fonterra's trio of Sri Lankan factories say they don't know what they would do if they ever had to change jobs.

Around 30 of Fonterra's 600 employees at the five-hectare site, on the outskirts of Colombo, have been there since the New Zealand Dairy Board first ventured into the island nation a quarter of a century ago. Another 125 have notched up 15 years there.

Ranjani Gunawardena, who has worked at the factory for nearly 30 years, joined when she was 19 and was one of 30 workers and could not think of herself in any other role. Now Fonterra employs in excess of 600 workers at the triple-factory site.

Janaka Weersingla, who has nearly 13 years' experience, came to his role at the plant from a farming background.

''I can't differentiate between a personal and corporate event,'' Janaka says. ''If it's my son's birthday, for example, it's my friends from the company who will come.'' Ranjani Heenatigala, the principal of the neighbouring primary school, says Fonterra has put rupee after rupee into the 1034-pupil and 31-teacher school. While Ranjani, or Fonterra, wouldn't say how much had been spent Fonterra was behind a new boundary wall, toilet block and revamped school hall  work the school could never have afforded.

Fonterra has also sought to be a good neighbour, sponsored a maternity clinic, provided milkpowder to a 50-child orphanage and stepped in with milkpowder and fresh water following a tsunami.

- © Fairfax NZ News