Business View Oceania | March 2020

73 74 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA MARCH 2020 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA MARCH 2020 AZWOOD ENERGY and most iconic brands and primary producers are highly engaged in transitioning away from fossil fuels.” According to the Bioenergy Association of New Zealand, “In the wood fuel supply sector Azwood Energy are now the national leader… in terms of range of product and extent of business.” As McKeown notes, “The Bioenergy Association is an important part of the industry. Their affiliation with Azwood goes back a number of years and we continue to help set the standards within New Zealand and push them forward.” Most Azwood employees have long tenure with the company. Up to 40 years. And an incredible depth of knowledge has grown with them. When needed, knowledge is also brought in from other high performing businesses in New Zealand. “We foster innovation in our employees,” says Crawford. “We have dedicated space and times for staff to innovate and experiment within the framework of our quality systems. And we actively encourage not just the successes but the failures. We learn from all of it. And it gives the staff the freedom to engineer solutions, come up with improvements, and use their knowledge to make life easier or their job more rewarding. It’s been really great as far as our success. We have a lot of new things coming, but this industry is competitive so we like to keep that up our sleeve. But it’s going to be a really exciting next few years with lots of plans for innovative progress in the business. Just watch this space it’s going to be amazing.” McKeown adds, “Speaking to the industry in general, there are two or three landmarked energy projects unfolding across the country and Azwood Energy is a part of that journey. No matter what our role is we are aligned to promoting successful wood energy projects throughout New Zealand. That’s our main goal. That knowledge and talent we have, we do share with our clients and prospective clients, as well as others in the industry, the Bioenergy Association and our central and local governments. Azwood Energy would like to thank all our industry partners, clients and customers for more than 40 years of relationship building and trust. They are all a meaningful part of our low-emission, sustainable circular economy and help us to live “our why.” The future of Azwood Energy revolves around the pursuit of a higher quality standard in the industry and being the market leader in that space. As Crawford attests, “While we are in this renewable green energy space, the team are also very pragmatic about the overall needs of the clients we service. We are very well aligned and adhering to the fact that this has to stack up commercially for our clients and we are a vital partner on that journey with them. We don’t bang the drum lightly, we are very aware that for our country to have a successful foothold in a low emissions future we need to protect our cost of production and make it stack up commercially for everyone involved.” PREFERRED VENDOR n Brenics Limited + 64 21 964 406