Revenue was up by 3 per cent to DKK 4,677 billion, and in Q4 alone revenue was 10 per cent higher than in the same period of last year.
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“We have an attractive and broad selection of products for the Danish market, where several of our concepts have been awarded two hearts by the Danish state consumer label Better Animal Welfare.
"For an extended period, we were challenged by weak sales to the foodservice market due to COVID 19, nevertheless we managed to consolidate our position during the past year, not least owing to our employees, who have delivered a tremendous effort during the pandemic,” says Finn Klostermann, CEO of Danish Crown Beef.
Danish Crown Beef recorded broad business improvement driven by strong operations in its two abattoirs in Denmark.
In Germany, operations have recovered strongly from the three week long COVID 19 winter shutdown of the abattoir in Husum, and focus is now on further developing the business.
Strong innovative power at the processing facility in Sdr. Felding continues to contribute new products, and we have finally succeeded in generating growth in several export markets.
Furthermore, the hides producer Scan Hide has successfully completed a turnaround. During the year, the company launched its SPOOR concept, which directly addresses the demand of quality conscious customers for increased traceability in leather production.
The positive development in Danish Crown Beef, and not least the strong results in the jointly owned processing companies Danish Crown Foods, KLS in Sweden, Polish Sokolów and ESS Food allowed Danish Crown Beef to increase the supplementary payment to the cooperative owners from DKK 1.25 to DKK 1.30 per kilo for 2020/21.
“Being a part of a strong group truly generates value. Our share of earnings in the jointly owned processing companies makes a strong contribution to an excellent result in Danish Crown Beef. It also demonstrates the value of being a part of a cooperative company in which in addition to our primary business we get a share of the earnings generated downstream from the abattoirs and jointly open the doors to strong collaboration and trading partners both in Denmark and abroad,” says Karsten Willumsen, chairman of Beef Forum.
He emphasises that the success of Danish Crown Beef would not have been possible without the support of the cooperative owners:
“The cohesion we have in Danish Crown, where the suppliers own the company, provides some great possibilities for developing the business in a direction that is aligned with the wishes of our customers and the consumers,” he says. ■
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