Food drink
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South African food producer Tiger Brands will offer its processed meats business through two separate deals for a combined 428 million rand ($247 million), it stated on Monday.
The disposal of business, which was closed briefly in 2018 after the world’s biggest listeriosis break out, belongs to a tactical evaluation started prior to that break out and concluded that the service was “not a perfect fit” within the group’s portfolio.
Molare Proprietary Limited will purchase the abattoir organization at Olifantsfontein while the meat processing factories at Germiston, Polokwane and Pretoria will be gotten by Silver Blade Abattoir Proprietary Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Country Bird Holdings, Tiger Brands said.
Molare, among South Africa’s largest piggery organizations and one of the main providers to the abattoir operation, will pay 117 million rand for its acquisition while Silver Blade will pay 311 million rand for the factories.
” One of the major outcomes we would have achieved by offering the services as going concerns is that the tasks of practically 1,000 staff members will be safeguarded,” stated Tiger Brands Chief Executive Noel Doyle.
The company is facing a class action claim over its function in the listeriosis outbreak, which killed more than 200 people in South Africa and was traced back to a factory run by Tiger Brands-owned Business Foods.
Tiger Brands said that any possible liability under the class action will not move to the new owners.
As part of the contracts, the company indemnifies the buyers versus any possible liability that might occur on conclusion of the legal process, Tiger Brands said.
($ 1 = 17.3430 rand)
Reporting by Nqobile Dludla; Editing by David Goodman
for-phone-only for-tablet-portrait-up for-tablet-landscape-up for-desktop-up for-wide-desktop-up
