Apple business boosts BayWa's bottom line

German conglomerate BayWa has published strong financial results for the third quarter of 2015, thanks in part to a better performance at its New Zealand fresh produce operation Turners & Growers (T&G) and associated subsidiaries.

The group reported earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) of roughly €35m for the three-month period, with the overall equivalent figure for January to September coming in at €75.3m, a slight increase on the €74.5m it posted in the first nine months of 2014.

Revenues for the nine-month period came in at €11.1bn, falling just short of the €11.4bn generated in January-September 2014 primarily due to price trends, BayWa said.

In the fruit business, revenues up to the end of September had reached €473.7m, up from €432.7m in the year-earlier period. EBIT was €22.1m, well up on €15.9m for the same nine months of 2014.

The group said it had benefited from “activities and acquisitions” at T&G, which included the purchase of apple grower-shipper Apollo Apples back in December 2014.

http://www.fruitnet.com/eurofruit/article/163554/tg-completes-acquisition-of-apollo-apples

German fruit trading was more stable than in the previous year, it stated, thanks to a slight rise in apple prices – a positive trend that it expected would continue in the current marketing season.

As well as better results for T&G, BayWa’s overall improvement in the third quarter was predominantly driven by its international agriculture and renewable energy businesses, which it said had “evened out the effects of problematic framework conditions” in Germany’s agricultural trade.

“Especially those times in which we experience a difficult situation in agriculture in Germany show how important our international growth strategy of recent years is,” commented chief executive Klaus Josef Lutz.

“We are only able to post these kinds of results after the first nine months of the year thanks to the good results in international grain trading and the outstanding development in European and US renewable energies project development business.”