November 2, 2009

Nutreco announced it has acquired a 51 percent shareholding in a Brazilian animal nutrition and fish feed company.

The activities will be continued in a new joint venture named 'Fri-Ribe' providing Nutreco and its partners, the existing owners, with a platform for jointly building a strong position in Brazil, one of the most important agriculture growth markets in the world.

The company to be acquired is active in the production and sales of premixes, farm minerals, compound feed, horse feed, pet food and fish feed. It consists of two privately-owned companies Fri-Ribe and Dispa that operate under the umbrella brand of Fri-Ribe.

They are important players in Brazil for shrimp and tilapia fish feed and also have key regional market positions in nutrition for beef cattle, dairy cattle and for horse feed. The companies have five production plants and six sales offices spread across the centre and north-east of Brazil. The companies have 400 employees and annual revenues amounted to EUR47 million (US$69.4 million) in 2008.

Frank Tielens, Nutreco's Executive Vice-President Specialties, said the animal nutrition market in Brazil is growing at approximately five percent a year on average and this acquisition brings Nutreco an excellent platform to facilitate its expansion in the South American country.