December 22, 2003

Cargill Alabama Soy Plant Temporary Shutdown

Agribusiness giant Cargill Inc announced last Friday the temporary shutdown of a soy processing plant in Guntersville, Alabama in the United States, due to tight supplies and poor profits.

The Wayzata, Minnesota-based company said in a statement that rapidly shrinking supplies from this year's U.S. soybean crop - the smallest since 1996 due to drought and other adverse weather in the Midwest - also contributed to the shutdown, which will take effect on Monday, January 5, 2004.

"It makes no sense for us to produce exportable surpluses in the short term, only to exacerbate the problem of dwindling domestic supplies we'll face next spring, so we are taking the appropriate action now," said R. Wayne Teddy, president of Cargill's North American Grain and Oilseed Crushing business.

"We anticipate that supply constraints will impact our soybean crush activities throughout the coming spring and summer," Teddy said. "Current conditions of poor margins and carrying charges support these actions," he added.

The Guntersville plant has 39 employees but none will be laid off during the period of plant downtime, Cargill said.