Kraft Foods, which has been present in Saudi Arabia through its products for close to 100 years, celebrated its launch as Mondelēz International, the world’s biggest snacking company, at its Nabrisco Arabia manufacturing plant in Dammam.

Mondelēz’s largest-selling iconic brands have been sold in the Kingdom for decades and include Kraft and Philadelphia Cheese, Tang, Cadbury Dairy Milk, Flake and Oreo.

The company increased production at its Dammam plant earlier this year, which operates as a joint venture with the local Olayan Group, in response to strong demand for the company’s products both within the Kingdom and across the GCC, said it top official.

Vishal Tikku, managing director GCC and shared services, said, "While our name might be new, we've had a strong heritage in Saudi for decades and millions of times a day consumers choose our iconic brands.We use our successful global approach, adapting global recipes to local tastes. Our inspiration comes from listening to consumers to create foods that fit their lives and we are committed to providing the same taste and quality to consumers in Saudi."

He highlighted the significant growth opportunity of the Kingdom as one of the most dynamic and lucrative confectionary markets in the world to staff at the facility.

"We hope Mondelēz's new focus on snacks will enable it to eat further into the Saudi Arabia market," he added.

The Saudi plant employs 70 people from six different nationalities, of which around 30 per cent are Saudi nationals.The popular Oreo biscuit, which celebrated its 100th birthday this year, is made at the plant using over 50 per cent of locally sourced ingredients and is exported across the GCC.

“This marks the start of a very exciting future as we become the world’s largest chocolate and biscuit maker and steadily grow our market share in Saudi Arabia - one of our strategic markets in the region," he added.

Kraft Foods changed its name to Mondelēz International, Inc. after spinning-off its North American grocery business on October 1 to create a high growth snacks business.

The Kraft Foods Saudi division is part of the Mondelēz International family of companies and certain legal entities within that division will change their names in due course, to reflect the name of the new global company.-TradeArabia News Service