Meet the Team - Shane Kidd

Shane brings more than three decades of experience across the global red meat industry, with a career that has taken him from the lower South Island to operations around the world.

Originally from Invercargill and raised in Oamaru, Shane attended Waitaki Boys’ High School before spending a year in Brazil as part of a student exchange, an experience that broadened his horizons and left him fluent in Portuguese. After returning to New Zealand, he trained as a chef in Christchurch and worked at Chateau on the Park, while also taking on seasonal work at Alliance Group’s Pukeuri plant.

What began as a holiday job soon developed into a long-term career. Shane progressed from labouring roles to becoming a lamb slaughterman, before moving north to work with Richmond Limited (now Silver Fern Farms), gaining experience across beef, bobby calf, and venison operations. During this time, he completed three years of study through Massey University and stepped into a supervisory role.

His career then took him to Australia, where he spent seven years with Teys Brothers in Rockhampton, one of the country’s major beef processing hubs. From there, he joined JBS in Melbourne as Beef Shift Manager before being promoted to Assistant Plant Manager, later working across multiple sites in Tasmania and New South Wales.

After 25 years in the industry, Shane shifted direction slightly, working as a consultant on beef production and contributing to an international project with Meat & Livestock Australia, which saw him based in Vietnam. He was later appointed Operations Director for Widam Food Company in Qatar, overseeing multi-species processing including beef, lamb, and camel, before taking on an additional role as Commercial Director and expanding the business into international markets.

Shane has recently returned to New Zealand with his Brazilian wife and their four-and-a-half-year-old twins. The move was driven by a desire to reconnect with family and provide a lifestyle that allows their children to enjoy the outdoors rather than the constant cool air-conditioned indoor lifestyle they experienced in Qatar due to the extreme heat.

Shane joined ANZCO Foods in January to head up our Canterbury site in January after recognising the opportunity to contribute his global experience to the New Zealand industry.

Outside of work, Shane’s focus is firmly on family life. He’s enjoying the opportunity to be outdoors again and is looking forward to getting back into activities such as hiking, fishing, and football. For now, though, he is simply pleased to be back and confident the move home was the right decision.

Fun facts

• Beach or mountains?
  Beach
• Text or call?
  Call
• If you won the lottery on Saturday, what’s the first thing you’d do?
  Thank God
• If you could instantly master any skill, what would it be?
  Drums - I play the drums and if I could have instantly mastered it I would have saved myself the need to have spent so many hours of practice!
• What was your first concert?
  Olodum, in Brazil in 1994!
• If you had to eat one cuisine for the rest of your life, what would it be?
  Vietnamese (especially Bun Cha!)