One of Wodonga’s biggest employers has attributed cost pressures of Australian manufacturing and a saturated pet food market for seeking up to 32 redundancies.

They will be sought via expressions of interest and a skills and capability assessment.

In 2009, Mars Petcare announced the loss of 64 information technology jobs.

“We’re committed to supporting associates through placement in new roles, or helping them to find work with other local organisations,” Wodonga plant director Brett Brown said.

“For many of our associates, some who have 30 or even 40 years of working for Mars, the next few months will be the right time to say goodbye to the business, taking advantage of the full entitlements of their enterprise agreements.

“We’re competing in a global market, and in order to protect Australian jobs, we have to re-organise the way we do our work.”

The company has 243 workers in the manufacturing and reliability division and the 32 redundancies represents about 13 per cent of the section set to depart.

The total workforce is 500-plus and Mars Petcare is still running three shifts at its Wodonga factory which has undergone a recent $50 million expansion to enter into the single serve trays market.

But National Union of Workers organiser Mark Schmidt confirmed the bulk of the departures sought would be coming from the single serve section and voluntary redundancies had been ruled out by the company.

“It is a bit of a shock and a bit disappointing in the sense we’re bargaining at the moment (for a new agreement) and there were no real serious talks about the position the company was in,” he said.

“Three weeks ago the company said they weren’t going ahead with redundancies, but things have now changed.”