The group, which had turnover in 2014 of €7.4bn ($8.02bn), acquired a stake in H. Boegel from Singapore-listed commodities group, Wilmar International Ltd, earlier this month.
Wilmar had announced in September last year its interest in selling off a percentage of the trading arm.
Agravis CEO, Dr Clemens Grosse Frie, told us the deal will give it direct access to the Asian purchase markets for palm-based animal feed ingredients including palm expellers. ʺIt secures supply for our own feed production plants and the domestic market as a whole,” he said.
He said management is convinced that taking a share in Boegel is “another small step towards enhancing Agravis’ profitability.”
In terms of ensuring sustainability in the sourcing of palm based feed materials, Frie noted Wilmar had been a responsible player in that regard during the last few years and had shown committment to ensuring certified sustainable production of palm products. “That is important to us,” said Frie.
Palm kernel expeller is a by-product of the crushing and expelling of oil from palm kernel. Due to its balanced energy and protein, high fiber, good level of residual oil and high palmitic acid, the expeller is widely used in compound feeds for adult ruminant livestock such as dairy and beef cattle.
Asset hunt
The Münster and Hannover based Agravis is aiming to stabilize turnover through growth, businesses in new regions, international expansion and a greater share of the market.
In terms of other notable acquisitions by the German cooperative, last year Agravis and Danish group, DAVA, jointly acquired the grain trading activities of the Rendsberg based agribusiness group, Getreide AG.
That business, which has a strong presence in the German states of Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Sachsen and Niedersachsen, now operates as an independent corporate group under the name of Ceravis AG.
It is said to have total revenue of about €1bn, an annual turnover of about 2.5 million tons of crops, 400,000 tons of feed, 400,000 tons of fertilizer, 60,000 tons of seed and €60m worth of plant protection.
In June 2015, Raiffeisen Uckermark, a subsidiary of Agravis, revealed it was investing €9m in the construction of nine new silos in the port of Schwedt in Brandenburg.
And, in July 2015, Agravis bought a turkey feed production facility from the Heidemark group. That plant, which has annual capacity of 270,000 tons, is located in Höltinghausen.