Co-hosted by the State Administration for Market Regulation of P.R.China, the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, the Silk-road Planning and Research Center, and the Codex Alimentarius Commission, the Belt and Road Eco-agriculture and Food Safety Forum was successfully held on November 6, 2020 at the Shanghai National Convention and Exhibition Center.

Bruno Chevot, Senior Vice President, Danone Group attended the Forum and delivered a speech.

Nov 6, 2020, Shanghai, China
 


Your honorable Director MA Chunliang,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Good afternoon,

I feel it a great pleasure to be able to join you here today, as we explore the topic of “promoting high-quality dairy development”. First of all, I’d like to express my gratitude to both the State Administration of Market Regulation and the forum organizer, who invited me for this sharing session. Thank you for all the elaborate efforts in delivering a successful forum!

Dedicated to bringing health through food to as many people as possible, Danone is a Fortune 500 global food & beverage company built on three main businesses as Essential Dairy and Plant-Based, Waters, and Specialized Nutrition, and we have a long list of globally-famous brands, to name a few, Aptamil, Nutrilon, evian and Activia.

With a solid foothold in the China market over the past 30 years, Danone has always been committed to improving Chinese consumers’ health life quality.

We’re an expert of the dairy industry. By sales value, we rank No.1 worldwide in Essential dairy and plant-based products, and No.2 worldwide in Early Life Nutrition. Danone’s Early Life Nutrition business boasts premium resources from the world’s Golden Milk Source Belt as well as a strong matrix of brands, many already household names around the globe and in China. Products of both quality and safety are the cornerstone for us to cultivate a high-quality dairy business.

Here in China, consumption upgrading and expanded lower-tier market presence have already become the New Normal. So based on our close proximity to the China market, we fully dig into the needs of Chinese consumers for localized R&D and production.

In this past July, we unveiled the Danone Open Science Research Center for Life-transforming Nutrition in Shanghai. With this new open science and innovation platform, Danone will continue to focus on health-related research fields such as breastmilk research, gastrointestinal health, and food safety & quality.  We will also take advantage of the center to bring together global expertise and local resources for the research and development of localized solutions that cater to the specific needs of Chinese consumers.

Also in 2020, Danone Early Life Nutrition acquired an infant formula company in Qingdao to establish Danone Specialized Nutrition (Qingdao) Co., Ltd., which is expected to kick off production in 2021. This represents our new localized business layout that centers on the needs of Chinese consumers. By investing in local production sites, Danone seeks to quickly bring our localized research results to market in the form of tangible products to better serve Chinese consumers.

As we all know, China now sits on the forefront of the global digital revolution. Danone has also been leveraging China’s local digital advantages to vigorously strengthen technology- and channel-related innovations. For example, we foster a stronger digital presence in China’s lower-tier cities, by developing Danone’s self-operated e-platform. It is able to provide real-time updates on inventories and needs for all M&B stores across the country, ensuring timely, accurate relay of sales information. That helps Danone deliver fast response, allocate resources in a targeted manner, and ensure product supply, while fast relaying our various value-added services to consumers.

Our other local applications based on digital innovation also include easy-to-use tools like the “Stool Tracker” and the “Growth Tracker”, helping Chinese consumers turn their “invisible” health status to “tangible” information that allows easier comprehension. In short, they help Chinese parents fully master their children’s overall nutrition status, timely understand nutrition’s impact on health and growth, and take relevant coping measures.

We can proudly say these local applications are all innovative solutions based on the needs of local consumers. At the same time, we also hope that such practices and achievements of R&D, production and digital innovation that we’ve realized in the China market can not only be here in China to serve China, but also head abroad to benefit the whole world.
 
As you know, "dual circulation" is a hot word since this year, and Danone's strategy is consistent with the internal and external circulation strategy of Chinese government. That said, our participatory theme “In China, For China and the World” for this year’s CIIE clearly manifests our understanding of the Dual Circulation Development Pattern: on one hand, deeply understanding the China market, achieving proximity to Chinese consumers, and using high-quality products and services to benefit more Chinese consumers and even the whole industry chain that includes distributors and retailers, which represents our internal circulation; on the other hand, fully leveraging local experiences, exporting our insights and concepts in the China market to across the world, and promoting advanced applications in China to the world to benefit global consumers.

Danone will fully utilize its solid experience in the health and nutrition industry and explore various resources in both local and global markets, to help drive the Chinese dairy industry’s upgrade and transformation as well as contribute to the formation of the Dual Circulation development pattern that sees inter-complementing domestic and international economic activities.

To conclude, I’d like to again thank SAMR for its long-standing support to Danone, and welcome all leaders and guests to visit the Danone booth inside CIIE’s Hall 2.2, where we jointly celebrate Danone’s latest global innovations as well as our firm commitments to the China market.

Xie Xie Da Jia!