(Yicai Global) May 15 -- Elders Ltd., a well-known Australian farm produce exporter, is literally beefing up its input into the Chinese market, with a view to exporting more products. As the First China International Import Expo draws near, Elders expects to deliver even more high-quality products to more Chinese.

The company has been operating in China for 14 years, said Mark Allison, its chief executive, in a recent interview. It sells high-end branded beef business in many large cities to supply products to hotels and restaurants and has opened a plant in a Shanghai suburb which processes authentic Australian meats imported directly from its Killara feedlot in New South Wales, Australia.

Elders, which has 2,000 employees across Australia, has set up 220 branch offices in all agricultural regions across the country, Allison said. Elders' employees monitor products to be exported throughout the process, from the birth of a calf until it is shipped out from the feedlot to China.

"Our ambitions are to make it a bigger business, but the key point for us is to make sure that we're actually providing the product that the Chinese public want for those hotels and restaurants," Allison said. For now, the conditions for making this ambition a reality are maturing. As for the First China International Import Export slated for November, this grand gathering holds a symbolic significance, and is conducive to advancing two-way economic and trade exchanges, Allison believes.

"In Australia, we produce food for 60 million people, we have 24 million, so there's export of 36 million people," he said, adding that most of the remaining food is exported to China, which is why the Expo is truly important for Australian enterprises.

Editor: Ben Armour