Bega Cheese says it is on track to wrap up its purchase of Mondelez’s Kraft brand grocery business in Australia and New Zealand on or before June 30.
The $460 million deal will see the NSW South Coast-based company buying Australia’s iconic yeast spread, Vegemite, and other Kraft brands.
Products joining the Bega business include peanut butter, mayonnaise, Kraft processed cheese, cheese slices and cheese-based meals, plus ZoOsh and Bonox spreads and dips.
To help pay for the Kraft acquisitions Bega this week finalised the $200 million sale of one of its two milk powder spray driers at Tatura in northern Victoria and its Melbourne-based infant formula finishing plant to long-time nutrition formula customer, Mead Johnson.
The final $20m payment in that transaction will be paid in December.
Bega’s executive chairman, Barry Irvin, said the arrangement with Mead Johnson would significantly reduce the bank funding required to pay for the Kraft business, which includes a 6.3 hectare Port Melbourne manufacturing site.
A2 formula surprise
The A2 Milk Company is more upbeat about nutritional formula sales to China having previously warned it was anticipating lower sales in the second half of 2016-17 than the first half.
The trans-Tasman company now expects infant formula sales to exceed those of the first six months.
“Demand for A2 Platinum infant formula has exceeded A2’s expectations and has been particularly strong in Australia, but also through the cross border e-commerce channel into China,” said managing director, Geoffrey Babidge.
A2 Milk was working closely with its New Zealand infant formula manufacturing partner, Synlait Milk, to lift its production schedule.
Group revenue for the full financial year was now forecast to be about $483.9m.
More food brands for sale
Japanese food and beverage company, Suntory, is to sell its Cerebos and Cerebos Greg businesses, responsible for popular food brands Fountain, Gravox and Saxa.
The company’s condiments and sauce range spanning salt, herbs, spices, tomato sauce and gravies, is expected to be sold by late this year for about $300m.
Suntory also has fresh coffee interests, including the Tobys Estate brand.
AACo assets gain $44m
Big beef business, Australian Agricultural Company (AACo), says recent property sale activity in northern Australia has lifted the value of its 7 million hectare pastoral property portfolio by about $44m to $659.4m.
The increased independent valuation by CBRE reflects sale price movement and 12 months of steady transactions in the Top End pastoral sector, where AACo has most of its 20-plus properties and the Livingstone abattoir near Darwin.
AACo, which releases its annual results on May 10, has also just announced the pending retirement of long-time property manager Henry Burke and his wife Bernadette.
Mr Burke joined AACo 37 years ago and in that time has led the management and development of many of its northern properties.
New Rabo grain researchers
Rabobank has appointed two new analysts, Cheryl Kalisch Gordon and Wes Lefroy to its to its food and agribusiness research team as grains and oilseeds analysts.
Dr Kalisch Gordon previously worked with GrainGrowers as a highly-regarded grains industry analyst and economist, while Mr Lefroy’s knowledge and experience has been in soil technology with Precision SoilTech in Western Australia.
He was formerly president of WA’s young farmer and agri professional group, AgConnectWA.
The two newcomers replace Rabobank’s previous grains and oilseeds analysts Graydon Chong and Ben Larkin, who moved to other roles in the bank.