OYSTAR. The Process & Packaging Group

Fresh Dairy Products in the Desert

The Saudi dairy company Almarai defies the climatic conditions of the desert and processes fresh dairy products at the highest level of manufacturing. When it comes to filling and packaging the market leader in the Middle East region has relied on high performance machines from OYSTAR for years. OYSTAR Gasti has just delivered the eleventh packaging line to Saudi Arabia, while OYSTAR Benhil already receives its next order.

In the Gulf region the demand for fresh products made from cow’s milk continues to increase – the market is growing at an annual pace of approximately 4.5%. As a result a competitive dairy industry has been established in the meantime. A large share of local requirements is already covered by domestic production. More than sixty companies – from smaller processing plants to completely integrated producers with their own extensive herds of dairy cattle – currently compete on the market. When it comes to fresh dairy products the regional market leader is Almarai, with an approximately 50% share of the market. Though the farms of the dairy company with over 50,500 dairy cows and 35,500 beef cattle may be located in the middle of the Saudi desert, but owing to fully automated and air-conditioned stables and ultramodern hygienic production facilities fresh milk products can be manufactured without any restrictions at all. Despite – or precisely due to – the hot climatic conditions, Almarai boasts an excellent cold chain and manufactures more than 140 products that are supplied to the entire Gulf region by the company which was founded in the year 1976.

Almarai has relied on OYSTAR already for eight years for high performance machines for filling and packaging dairy products. Thus, for example, Almarai commissioned the company OYSTAR Gasti with supplying a total of eleven filling and packaging lines for its yogurt production. At the end of the year 2009 OYSTAR Gasti, the specialist for cup filling and sealing machines, delivered the last machine of this sizeable order in the form of the fourth Contitherm 123 to Saudi Arabia by ship.

With an output of 30,000 cups per hour the Contitherm 123 represents the world’s fastest continuously working machine for filling products such as yogurts and desserts. The new machine for Almarai will fill inoculated yogurt milk and – despite the high speed – transport it for sealing without spilling. In addition, recontamination through ambient air is prevented by sterile excess air pressure in the entire filling area up to the sealing station. The final product is a semi-solid yogurt – a typical product of the Arab peninsula, where stirred yogurt (fruit yogurt) is hardly manufactured.

Front Runner for Butter
Apart from the principal vendor OYSTAR Gasti, other OYSTAR Group companies also cooperate successfully with the Saudi dairy enterprise. OYSTAR Benhil received an order for a heavy-duty MULTIPACK 8000 machine for wrapping butter. The machine will also be connected downstream to a wraparound packer from OYSTAR A+F. The MULTIPACK 8000 is the highest performance wrapping machine in the world for butter, margarine, cooking fat and other pasty products for measured quantities of between 100 and 500 grams. At the Almarai production plant the machine will manufacture butter in package sizes of 100, 200 and 400 grams.

The output of the MULTIPACK 8000 amounts to up to 250 packages per minute. The machine is convincing particularly with regard to its flexibility when it comes to the various formats and the wrapping materials employed. A clear increase in production efficiency is made possible through exceptionally quick format changes of less than forty-five minutes as well as changes in the package height within just five minutes. Moreover, the required space is reduced thanks to a modular machine concept with a clear structure and spatial separation of the drive and product area. Thus the respective components are also easily accessible for both operation and maintenance. Time constant and loss-free filling via lift elements also guarantee optimum filling accuracy with varying filling profiles. The dosing system can be cleaned in accordance with the Clean-In-Place Principle (CIP) – which saves both time and money.

Forming, Filling, Sealing
The order for the Multipack 8000 is the third to be placed with OYSTAR Benhil by Almarai. OYSTAR Benhil supplied two machines in the medium capacity range already in the year 2006: a MULTIPACK 5000, likewise for packages of 100, 200 and 400 grams of butter as well as a MULTIPACK 8345 for 1,000 gram packages. In addition, OYSTAR Erca-Formseal, with its principal place of business in France, is represented in Saudi Arabia with a forming, filling and sealing machine; that is, the EF 300, which fills the cream cheese product Petit Filou into 18,000 cups per hour. OYSTAR Erca-Formseal developed this FFS technology more than fifty years ago and thus revolutionized the packaging market. The technology of heating up the plastic foil, forming, filling, sealing and then finally separating the individual cups with a single machine provided the company with a worldwide monopoly at the time.

For its part OYSTAR Hassia is represented at Almarai as the leader in technology for portion packaging with a THL 24/28 model, including a SPH 25/50 case packing system for manufacturing butter portion packages. The plant can form, fill and seal up to 37,500 cups per hour with filling quantities of between 10 and 25 grams in five rows with five cups each. Another special feature includes a 25-fold TLR–CIP type vertical dosing system for slightly pasty products in the filling range between 8 and 40 cm³ and additional equipment for filling butter with cross nozzles for optimum product distribution in the cup.

The SPH 25/50 case packer with a walking beam conveyor downstream to the thermoformer can pack five layers of 25 cups each. This means that the case packing system can deposit complete punch formats in several layers into cartons. The walking beam conveyor takes one punch cycle horizontally out of the punch and moves one completely punched unit by overlapping in longitudinal and cross directions during transport to stabilize the tableau and minimize the carton size. The transfer unit then deposits the tableaus in several layers in one or two cartons.

More Yogurt for the Desert
With these multiple orders Almarai is the largest OYSTAR Group customer in the Gulf region – but not the only one: All of the important dairies on the Arab peninsula have already been equipped with filling and sealing machines from OYSTAR Gasti. And the Near East also relies on OYSTAR: In Libya Al Nassem – the first Libyan dairy company at all – commissioned three forming, filling and sealing plants from OYSTAR Erca-Formseal in the year 2009. The FFS machines, type EF 320L pack yogurt in 110 gram cups in packs of four or six at a rate of 21,600 cups per hour.

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