LOS ANGELES, Calif. (From The Australian) -- Billionaire paper, packaging and recycling magnate Anthony Pratt has challenged America's most populous state to double the value of its food exports to more than $40 billion annually as his company prepares to build its first hi-tech box plant in California.

The chairman of Pratt Industries told The Wall Street Journal's inaugural Global Food Forum dinner in Los Angeles that California, known as America's "salad bowl", had the potential to ­become the "salad bowl of the world".

"To seize this opportunity, we must address two urgent issues -- the impact on our farmers of the severe and widespread drought, now in its sixth year, and a steep decline in food harvesting ­productivity, which in some cases leaves 20 per cent of crops in the field to rot," Mr Pratt told the forum.

In an interview with The Australian on the sidelines of the event, Mr Pratt revealed that Pratt Industries was planning to build a box factory in California using the robotics model at a similar Pratt plant at Beloit in the US state of Wisconsin that produces 135,000 tonnes of product per annum with only 98 staff, compared to the 200 employees at a conventional plant.

"We are going to build a major, hi-tech, robotic corrugated box factory, because in California you need to have as few people as ­possible," he said.

He declined to comment on the cost of the new factory, but it expected to be higher than the final $US70 million cost of the ­Beloit facility, which will be ­officially opened in March.

Pratt Industries, the fifth-biggest packaging company in the US, made its first acquisition in California in 2015 when it bought fruit and vegetable packaging firm Robert Mann Packaging.

Seventy per cent of America's fruit and vegetables are grown within 320km of Robert Mann's operations just south of Salinas on the central California coast.

The deal provided Mr Pratt's US business with its first link to Visy's Australian operations as the paper converted into packaging by Robert Mann is being sourced directly from Visy's Kraft paper mills in Tumut in the NSW Riverina.

The white paper box product produced by the Tumut paper is known as "koala board" and is thinner than conventional sheet product, so is cheaper for clients.

Mr Pratt has previously said that his company's California business alone would grow to generate revenues of $1bn for Pratt Industries over the course of the next decade and that the company would eventually build a paper mill on the US West Coast.

"That is still a long-term thing. But for the time being we plan to use the West Coast to integrate Tumut. I see the US West Coast as a great hedge against tougher conditions in China.

"Tumut is our open market mill so we sell a lot of its product to China. But we are operators here as opposed to China, where we are just selling into the open market.

"Given America has the best balance of sovereign risk in the world, we will build our asset base here to integrate Tumut."

Mr Pratt, whose Visy and Pratt Industries companies in Australia and the US are major suppliers of cardboard boxes to the food and beverage sectors, said there were big synergies between California, Australia and Israel in water technologies.

"Two-thirds of California is in extreme drought. Australia has big drought issues. Israel made the desert bloom; they are the ultimate experts in water because they had to, out of necessity, create some ventures. Innovation is going to become increasingly important in farming, especially for productivity in farming," he said.

"You can't get workers in California any more because the kids don't want to do what their parents did in terms of Mexican immigration. So there is a labour shortage.

"Google has bought eight companies in the last couple of years to address the problems of food growing in California. So Silicon Valley is helping the food bowl of America and I think that is going to have flow-on effects in Australia." Pratt Industries has spent more than $US600m on 10 acquisitions, factory extensions or new constructions over the past two years in America and Mr Pratt confirmed it was still ahead of schedule to reach its target of $5bn in sales in the next five-to-seven years.

He said despite concern about the impact of president-elect Donald Trump's policies, "the US economy is booming".

"In our industry inventory levels are as low as they have ever been so that is a barometer of the supply-demand balance ... So far Donald Trump has been an outstanding tonic for the economy. I think he has been great."

Mr Pratt has previously claimed America would "continue to power on".

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Join Jim Thompson on the 2nd Annual Papermakers Mission Trip to Guatemala, 22 - 29 July 17. Build houses, talk about the pulp and paper industry. For more information, email jthompson@taii.com with "Guatemala" in the subject line.