CJ Cheiljedang has decided to secure half of its annual sales from abroad from next year to upgrade its position as a trailblazing global food and bio enterprise.

To achieve the goal, the company will push the localization of its products and brands overseas and continue to invest in R&D activities to make its localized overseas operations stronger.

The leading foodstuff maker in Korea will make the most of its foodstuff products as strategic commodities for export under a global marketing strategy.

The makkoli rice wine native to Korea, “CJ Bibigo Oishi Makkoli,” which was exported to Japan in cans for the first time by the company early this year, posted 3.5 billion won in sales in the first quarter and the company projects sales for this year will reach 10 billion won because the drink is being sold in an increasing number of major supermarket chains in Japan. The special canned rice wine is like a cocktail in its form made to the taste of Japanese customers, especially younger customers, as it is mixed with up to 15 percent grapefruit juice. The Hallyu fad in Japan has been helpful to the sale of the CJ Bibibo Oishi Makkoli, boosting its popularity among Japanese rice wine lovers.

“Hatban” the instant cooked rice that created a large market in Korea, has been successfully sold at major supermarkets overseas cutting the time needed to reach overseas customers.

The company has successfully been selling its foodstuff including Hatban and other packaged foods such as mandu and red pepper paste for broiled beef in Mexico thanks to its success at Costco supermarkets in the North American country. The company expects to put them on the shelves of Sam’s Club, an affiliate supermarket chain of Wal-Mart, in Mexico with some 170 stores.

“It’s the result of the company’s marketing strategy to sell them at supermarket chains in major foreign countries directly. The company’s export unit members flew to many countries in the world to discuss the sales of our foodstuff products with major supermarket chains in those countries, even if they were only allowed 30 minutes for their talks,” said Director Chang Young-sok of the public relations department.

The company has been working on spurring its bio business with continued large investments in the sector to secure a technological advantage and expand its global green bio market. The company has already strengthened its grip on the world’s hexane and ricin markets and has even entered the methionine market and plans to build a system for the production of four amino acids, key ingredients for animal feeds, through environmentally friendly biotechnologies.

The company is building a plant to produce lysine to take a leap toward becoming a leading global firm in the bio business with continued investments and global territory expansion. The company will produce lysine from the new plant starting next year. The company’s Shenyang plant in China, built at a cost of $400 million, has already been turning out ricin and amino acid for animal feeds, and expects to dominate the global markets for those products. The company plans to corner 48 percent of the global hexane market to close the gap with Japan’s Ajinomoto by just 10 percent.

Following eight years of R&D efforts, the company has developed the technologies for the production of environmentally friendly methionine by mixing raw sugar and glucose beginning in 2014.

The company also will soon start the construction of a methionine plant capable of producing 80,000 tons of the product annually in the Kertan region in Terangganu state in Malaysia with a total investment of around $400 million in cooperation with Arkema Co. of France, which has the knowhow for key raw materials for the product.