The Queensland floods maybe the biggest natural disaster in Australian history, with the clean up and recovery likely to take months, if not years, to fully complete, leaving a devastating legacy of personal, social and financial cost.

Last Friday Suntory Holdings Ltd Japan through Suntory Aust donated $100,000 to the “Premier’s Disaster Relief Appeal”.

This donation was made on behalf of all the Australian subsidiaries - Suntory Aust., Frucor and Cerebos.  All group companies have operations in Queensland and some will have family and friends impacted by this disaster. I am sure you will join me in sending our best wishes to all those affected.

This is an extremely generous donation by our parent company, who in the recent past has demonstrated their social responsibility with similar donations to the Christchurch earthquake appeal in September 2010, and the South East Asia tsunami several years earlier.

In speaking with Ben Inglis, it appears that our Queensland team have made it through relatively unscathed and, in fact, joined the clean up operation to help others.