May 6 (SeeNews) - Dutch dairy manufacturer FrieslandCampina opened a new pressed cheese production line at its Napolact factory in Cluj, in northwestern Romania, following a 3 million euro ($3.2 million) investment.
The investment is part of an annual programme to enhance production at the Cluj-Napoca plant plant, FrieslandCampina said in a press release on Thursday.
"The new pressed cheese production line we have inaugurated today has an annual capacity of over 3,000 tonnes and creates 40 new jobs in the field of cheese production, for the people of Cluj," FrieslandCampina Romania general manager Ferenc Szecsko said.
Napolact now makes three types of cheese at the Cluj plant, as well as butter and milk.
The production capacity of plant in Cluj is 8,000 tonnes of cheese and butter per year and of up to 35,000 tonnes of milk.
In 2004, Friesland bought three dairy factories in Romania - two in Cluj and one in Targu Mures. In 2013, it closed one of the factories in Cluj and currently operates the other two where some 574 people work.
In 2020, FrieslandCampina's net profit profit almost doubled on the year to 29.7 million lei ($3.4 million /2.9 million euro), while its turnover grew to 469 million lei from 452 million lei in the previous year, latest data from the finance ministry showed.
FrieslandCampina is a Dutch dairy cooperative which resulted from a merger between Royal Friesland Foods and Campina in 2008.
(1 euro=4.9490 lei)