Bega ordered to hand over secrets to Kraft in legal skirmish

THERE’S a peanut butter war going on — and there has been an interesting twist in the latest skirmish between Kraft and Bega.

THERE’S a peanut butter war going on — and in the latest skirmish, a judge has ruled that local manufacturer Bega’s trade secrets must be handed to American food giant Kraft.

The pair are fighting for control of Australia’s $110 million peanut butter market.

Early last year, as part of the deal which saw Vegemite come home, Bega took over Kraft’s Port Melbourne factory and was given the licensing rights to Kraft peanut butter for 12 months, after it bought out Kraft spin-off Mondelez.

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The Kraft label.

The Bega label.

Bega now makes its own brand peanut butter, claiming in TV ads that it’s the Kraft version relabelled. It is packaged almost identically.

In the fallout — Kraft is fighting Bega in the Federal Court in Melbourne and in a New York court — it has ­demanded peanut butter documents from Mondelez.

Last week, Justice David O’Callaghan ordered that the papers be handed over, but under strict conditions.

Only a few local QCs and lawyers acting for Kraft will be able to see them, they can only use them during the case, and they must not reveal their contents to Kraft chiefs in the US.

The documents will be held in a locked, secret drawer.

It’s not immediately obvious why the documents are so special — peanut butter ingredients seem to be just peanuts, oil, sugar and salt — but Mondelez’s lawyers fought the handover, arguing that the ­information, once revealed, “cannot be forgotten”.

But Judge O’Callaghan ruled that lawyers can be trusted not to misuse them.

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