The Canada-based cooperative announced the intended acquisition earlier in July.
The agreement is subject to review and approval by the competition authorities, a process that could take several months to complete, said a spokesperson from the cooperative.
The proposed acquisition brings all the swine-related assets of F. Ménard to La Coop fédérée and its Olymel and Sollio Agricultural divisions.
La Coop fédérée is a Canada-wide agricultural cooperative and the largest agri-food company in Quebec. It has more than 120,000 members, more than 14,000 employees and sales of $6.5bn. Sollio Agriculture is the agricultural division of La Coop fédérée. Olymel is focused on poultry and pork production, processing and distribution.
F. Menard is an integrated pork producer with more than 1,200 employees, with annual production of more than 1.1m hogs. It represents about 15% of the pork production in Quebec, the cooperative said.
The deal covers all aspects of the company’s pork production process including the manufacturing of feed needed to raise the hogs and the feed mills, the La Coop fédérée spokesperson told us.
F. Ménard also has poultry production interests, but they did not fall under this deal, he added.
The acquisition is anticipated to allow F. Ménard to continue its development within Olymel and Sollio Agriculture, said Ghislain Gervais, president of La Coop fédérée’s Executive Committee. “Olymel has all the resources and expertise to help F. Ménard grow, take its expertise further and leverage the growth resulting from this agreement,” he added.
The decision to sell the company was one made to “ensure a promising future” for it, said Luc Ménard, executive director with F. Ménard. The decision was made to help preserve and develop what the family-owned company had built.
“A Canadian buyer such as La Coop fédérée and its Olymel and Sollio Agriculture divisions was an obvious choice for the company’s future,” he said.
Acquisition highlights
The deal includes a “major” milling operation, the spokesperson said. The facilities have an annual production of more than 500,000 tons, work with multiple grains including corn and wheat and previously generated complete feeds for pork and poultry.
The sites included in the agreement are two mills in Saint-Pie-de-Bagot and Ange-Gardien along with facilities for grain drying and storage in Sainte-Brigide-d’Iberville, the cooperative said.
“F. Ménard’s expertise and employees will be invaluable in positioning Sollio Agriculture’s milling activities and strengthening our leadership role in the marketing of agricultural inputs in Canada,” said Sébastien Léveillé, CEO with Sollio Agriculture.
The animal feed operations are set to continue independently after the deal is completed, he added.
Additionally, the tie-up includes acquisition of all the F. Ménard hog farms, a pork product facility in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, a slaughter facility and deboning plant in Ange-Gardien, a specialized processing plant in Henryville, a transportation fleet and two specialty butcher shops, the cooperative said.
“The Ange-Gardien slaughtering and cutting plant has a weekly slaughter capacity of 25,000 hogs on one shift,” the cooperative reported. “The Henryville further processing plant has been in operation since 2011 and covers an area of 70,000 square feet.”
All swine production and processing facilities are set to be managed by Olymel L.P. the cooperative added.
