Bega Group

Focus: An ongoing journey towards circularity.​

Background: Bega Group was one of the founding members of the Regional Circularity Co-operative and has been closely involved with the Bega Circular Valley program since it was launched in 2021. In early 2023 they re-affirmed their long-term commitment to the program by providing $5 million in funding and donating the land for the National Circularity Centre.​

Circular innovation: Circularity has gradually increased in importance over the last four years for the Bega Group and is now one of the three pillars of their long-term sustainability strategy. Within the pillar they call out a current focus on resource efficiency and emissions reduction.​

This focus has led to a range of tangible circularity focused initiatives being implemented across their operations nationally, with some of those that have been brought in at their manufacturing sites in the Bega Valley, for example, including participation in a heat recovery project to optimise energy efficiency onsite, and reusing factory waste-water for irrigation on neighbouring dairy farms.​

They also recently upgraded a boiler used to generate steam used in site-wide manufacturing processes to run on wood waste biomass sourced from a local sawmill rather than gas – leading to a substantial reduction in electricity usage.​

Impact and future development: Looking ahead, they will continue to explore the substantial opportunities that exist in becoming more circular across the organisation, with short-term projects planned including a logistics optimisation project to improve the overall efficiency of their transport network and building of a 3.5MW solar farm with battery storage next to the Ridge Street manufacturing site in Bega to continue their shift towards more renewable sources of energy.​

For more information: www.begagroup.com.au/sustainability/circularity/