Tuesday 12 April 2016 04:49 PM
Fonterra board size in focus in first governance overhaul since inception
By Jonathan Underhill
April 12 (BusinessDesk) - Fonterra's board and shareholders' council successfully opposed a remit to shrink its board at
last year's annual meeting and the outcome of this week's first-ever governance overhaul may hold that line while
proposing other changes to ensure the best spread of boardroom skills.
New Zealand's biggest exporter is scheduled to release a set of proposals to refresh its governance structures - both at
board and shareholders' council level - on Thursday, with the aim of putting any proposed changes to its structure
before shareholders for a vote in May. Auckland-based Fonterra hasn't changed its governance and representation
arrangements since being set up 15 years ago although it undertook a full review in 2013.
A majority of Fonterra's farmer-shareholders supported a proposal to reduce the board to nine from 13 at the annual
meeting last October but the vote fell short of the 75 percent needed, including a requirement for 50 percent support of
the shareholders' council, who echoed the board's view that a better option was to make any changes under a governance
review already under way. A booklet issued on Feb. 1 posed questions on whether the board was the right size and had the
right collection of skills, raised the same issues about the shareholders' council, and asked whether more needed to be
done to nurture the next generation of leaders.
"I'm pretty happy with the status quo. I don't see a major change coming," said Wayne Langford, a farmer in Golden Bay
and vice-chair of Federated Farmers' dairy industry group. "The review has been very good for helping farmers understand
the structures within Fonterra."
Langford unsuccessfully stood for the council last year and says he would like to see the council "step up" in terms of
addressing issues with Fonterra's board, but he was supportive of the current board size and said existing selection
processes tended to weed out unsuitable candidates. The remit on shrinking the board had been timely in as much as it
came as dairy prices were plunging and some farmers were looking around for someone to blame, he said.
But shareholders and former Fonterra directors Colin Armer and Greg Gent, who drove the calls for a reduced board, say
tweaks to governance won't cut it.
"Tweaks don't solve very much at all when people want substantive change," Gent said. "Our number one goal would be to
get a single-digit number of directors. A small board means there is no room for passengers. More urgent is that we need
a massive change to the Fonterra council. It was set up to provide a constructive challenge to the board but that's not
what they do."
Gent described the council as being "like a parliament in size" although it was "probably failing to attract a big cross
section of farmers". Others were blunter, but wouldn't put their names to comments such as that council membership was
"a junket" and councillors were more likely to agree with the board than challenge it.
Fonterra's February booklet listed 14 areas of skill needed on its board, including experience running a $1 billion-plus
business; global experience; audit, financial and risk management skills; knowledge of manufacturing and the global
commodities trade; experience at a senior level in consumer goods; a track record of commercial/value creation. It posed
similar questions for the Shareholders' Council: does it have the right focus; does its representation model "reflect
the global nature of our business"; is the councillor selection process right?
Rural Equities chairman David Cushing says a $1 billion-plus business needs "outstanding directors" while retaining the
right balance of farmers and independent directors appointed for their business acumen. The right mix was probably
slightly fewer farmers.
"Changes are required and absolutely there is room for improvement," he said. "We would have thought that was a pretty
common call around farmers." Fonterra had committed a lot of capital in developing its own dairy farms in China and in a
minority stake in a Chinese distribution company, Beingmate Baby & Child Food Co, the wisdom of which would become clearer over time. But Cushing said he preferred the Synlait Milk
model, where Chinese capital was invested in a New Zealand business, he said.
Fonterra wants to strengthen its governance and representation to ensure it can meet goals including lifting the volume
it collects to 30 billion litres of milk both in New Zealand and in overseas markets from 22 billion litres now, and
driving revenue to $35 billion over the next decade from $18.8 billion. It also wants to become the world's number one
ingredients supplier, and the number one or two consumer and food-service business in New Zealand, Australia, Sri Lanka,
Malaysia, Chile, China, Brazil and Indonesia.
Federated Farmers dairy industry chair Andrew Hoggard said it was a challenge to draw the right skills from a pool of
farmers but that is offset by the need to preserve farmer representation.
"This is a co-op so it is about having that touchstone to farming reality," he said. "It would be very easy to lose
track of what the core responsibility of the co-op is all about - a decent milk price and a good return on what we
produce."
Hoggard said a common complaint among farmers was that the council was "just yes men" and he cited guidance released by
Fonterra on palm kernel last year - something that had a bearing on shareholders' on-farm activities - where the council
wasn't consulted.
"But they do ask hard questions and do a good job. You can have robust debate about change behind the scenes," he said.
Councillors sometimes felt they didn't have the freedom to say what they liked in public because the media latched onto
to it as evidence of "rift at Fonterra".
(BusinessDesk)
ends