Global meat processing company Danish Crown has signed an approximately €300m supply agreement with Alibaba’s Win-Chain.

Danish Crown will supply 250t of pork from its processing facility in China for a period of five years.

Win-Chain Fresh Meat managing director Richard Wang said: “Danish produce enjoys an excellent reputation and Danish Crown products already have a large and loyal customer base in China.

“Danish Crown’s integrated farm-to-fork production ensures produce of a uniformly high quality, and Chinese consumers are also attracted by the strong focus on innovation and sustainability.

“We look forward to working closely together to bring quality Danish meat products to the over 600 million annual active consumers on Alibaba’s platforms.”

From next year, the cooperation will be extended to embrace a wider range of products, which will be processed and packaged at the Danish Crown factory in Pinghu outside Shanghai.

Danish Crown has been collaborating with the Alibaba Group since they entered into an agreement in August last year for selling and marketing of Danish Crown products on Alibaba’s Tmall.

Danish Crown Group CEO Jais Valeur said: “The Chinese market is evolving very rapidly at the moment, and there are actually three things happening all at once. First, e-commerce is exploding, with consumers buying the products they want online and having them delivered to their front door only a few hours later.

“In my view, Shanghai now has the world’s most advanced market for e-commerce. Next, instead of buying fresh meat at the so-called ‘wet markets’, consumers have started purchasing retail-packed products in the supermarkets, in exactly the same way that we shop in Denmark.”