Nutreco has announced that it has entered into a joint venture with distribution partners in the Ukraine to take advantage of the second largest animal feed market in Eastern Europe.
The agreement will see Nutreco take an additional one third share in the company Dutch Feed which will give the feed giant’s premix and specialities business, Trouw Nutrition International, a market leadership position in a fast growing market.
Nutreco has operated a feed specialties plant owned by Dutch Feed since 2011, which will now be incorporated into the new venture.
Dutch Feed had revenues of €15m in 2012 and produced around 20,000 tonnes of concentrates and young animal feeds in the same year. Production is expected to increase to 30,000 tonnes in 2013.
Ukraine’s feed market has been growing steadily by 5 to 10% per year. It’s already a leading cereal producer and is expected to become an important meat supplier to Europe in future.
Nutreco’s strategy is to improve profitability to an EBITA of €400m by 2016. It intends to do this by focusing on a higher value portfolio of premixes, feed specialties and fish feed. Also by expanding into the growing markets of Latin America, Russia, Asia and Africa, which it says will see the largest increases in production and consumption of animal protein food products.
