TOKYO/OSAKA — Major Japanese confectionary manufacturers like Lotte and Ezaki Glico are ramping up sales and production in Southeast Asia, hoping to tap the region’s growth as a declining population at home cuts into sales.
Lotte is setting up a new facility at an existing factory in Indonesia that will quadruple production capacity of its flagship Choco Pie snack to 20 billion yen ($147 million) on a value basis. Construction will begin this year with the plant slated to go into operation after 2025. Investment in the factory is said to be in the billions of yen.
