PCA won the prestigious Supreme Exporter Award as well as the Agribusiness trophy at the 2008 Queensland Japan Chamber of Commerce & Industry / Jalpak Travel awards held at Tattersalls Club in Brisbane yesterday.

Peanut Business Group General Manager Kevin Norman (pictured right with Export and Planning Manager Michelle Gilchrist), said PCA was pleasantly surprised to win the major award, especially as it was up against many worthy companies including some big mining and resource groups.

He was presented with the trophy by Japanese Consul-General Makoto Hinei and Minister for Transport, Trade, Employment and Industrial Relations John Mickel.

PCA has been exporting to New Zealand, the United Kingdom and parts of Europe for the past 20 years. However the focus on Japan has mainly developed over the past three years.

Last year PCA took out the Agribusiness award at the 2007 QJCCI / Jalpak Awards.

Kevin said the main sales were raw peanuts exported for various snackfood products. However PCA had also begun recently to export natural peanut butter to cater for a speciality market in Japan.

"The Japanese market is very much focussed on very high quality products," Kevin said.

"Australian farmers are able to produce a quality product that is also clean and green, which is very important to the Japanese."

PCA Exports To Japan 2005-2006 - 70mt 2006-2007 - 453mt 2007-2008 - 1792mt 2008-2009 (to end of Sept only) 1943mt

Export and Planning Manager Michelle Gilchrist said tonnages exported to Japan had continued to grow.

"This year (2008 season) we have already sold 1943 metric tonnes with another 2000 tonnes contracted to be delivered prior to the end of March 2009," she said.

This compared with 1792 tonnes for the whole of the 2007-2008 season (April 1, 2007 to March 31, 2008).

Kevin Norman said PCA was continuing to evolve its production processes and capacity to meet the stringent Japanese requirements.

"PCA's success has very much been a team effort, especially from the employees in the Raw Plant and Value Added Plant," he said.

"PCA's Market Development Manager Daniel Cook has worked closely with Japanese buyers and together with Michelle Gilchrist have provided excellent customer service to our Japanese customers."