Mr Hamish Drummond is a visionary Australian leader, who has tremendous drive and is an achiever recognised around the world. Using his initiative and knowledge of the health care industry, Mr Drummond created a successful nutrition and food technology business in Australia that is now listed on the Australian Stock Exchange.
In 1984, Mr Drummond formed his own fine chemical importation and consulting company in Australia, after working for many years around the world in the agricultural and pharmaceutical industry with industry leader Hoffman La-Roche.
Within five years, Mr Drummond formed a second company known as Clover Corporation that became the largest supplier of Evening Primrose oil, a source of novel nutrients known as essential fatty acids. At this time, Mr Drummond was appointed chairman of a biotechnology company that developed and produced a growth hormone, a product that was eventually sold to a US biotechnology company.
Mr Drummond recognised the need for essential fatty acid supplements for infant formulas since these fatty acids were crucial for the development of the infant brain. Mr Drummond realised that a good source of these essential fatty acids was from Evening Primrose oil (rich in gamma-linolenic acid) and tuna oil (a rich source of docosahexaenoic acid or DHA). The research conducted by and on behalf of Clover, under the guidance of Mr Drummond, led to the granting of a patent on the technology and a commercial infant formula that was sold in Australia & New Zealand. Mr Drummond then became involved in sourcing tuna oil (rich in DHA), and developed a long-standing relationship with HJ Heinz - Starkist in American Samoa. Clover was instrumental in solving a waste problem that Starkist had (pumping waste tuna oil into the sea) and at the same time gaining access to the raw material required for Clover’s business. This eventually led to the building of the only fish oil refinery in Australia at Altona North and to the first sales of Clover’s highly refined tuna oil to Europe in 1997.
The next phase in Clover’s business, was to develop technology to stabilise the tuna oil that is an inherently unstable product, because of the DHA. Clover, together with the significant support of WH Soul Pattinson, Food Science Australia, and with the aid of Commonwealth Government Grants developed and patented several processes known as micro-encapsulation which coated the tuna oil with dairy proteins and thus prevented the oil from exposure to air and subsequent oxidation. The stable product is a free-flowing powder and is known as DriphormTM; the process is now regarded as one of the best technologies in this industry and is used by the main supplier of essential fatty acids to the infant formula industry in USA. DriphormTM DHA is now used in the infant formula industry, in bread, in small goods, in yoghurt & in the coating of fish fingers. Clovers’ tuna oil known as HiDHATM is now sold worldwide to various food and supplement companies.
There has been international recognition of the success of Clover and Mr Drummond with the awarding of the American Oil Chemists’ Society Corporate Achievement Award in 2003 and the Australian Institute of Food Science and Technology Food Industry Innovation Award in 2003.