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The Denmark-based pork processing major has put the Pinghu-based factory up for sale, a spokesperson confirmed to Just Food.
The spokesperson declined to comment further, as ”it is a very, very small part of our business, which we have decided to divest as it didn’t develop in line with our expectations”.
The decision was taken through Niels Duedahl, who appointed general director of the company last August.
Duedahl is an outsider who replaced the company’s former leader executive, Jais Valeur, who announced in June that he stepping down as leader executive early than originally planned.
President Asger Krogsgaard said at that time that the company faces a “new strategy period” and at the beginning of a “significant transition. “
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The move comes just weeks after the Danish krone revealed it had taken the decision to avoid promoting new meat packaged in Germany as a component of its profitability efforts.
The decision will lead to the winding down of the Oldenburg Convenience division in Oldenburg in north-west Germany by the end of February.
Bacon heavyweight said in his 2023/2024 report that it was a year of “significant geopolitical and market shifts” that impacted the Danish Crown’s operations.
He said that by 2024/25 he expects “a steady reduction in slaughter animal production across Europe. “
“The decline speed slowed down in 2023/24, but the descending trend is still difficult. These production settings can have an effect on our origin chain and our price strategies, “he said.
It said that “the number of slaughtered animals in Northern Europe has decreased substantially”.
He added: “The contributing points are the sharp drop in demand for red meat in China, the arrival of African swine fever (ASF) in Germany and the sharp increase in raw material costs after the outbreak of war in Ukraine. We have also noticed a decline in piglet production in Germany, which has led to an increase in imports of piglets from Denmark, and all of this has created a need for consolidation on a scale we have never noticed before.
“This made the effective operation of our slaughterhouses incredibly difficult, however we have adjusted our capacity, leading to the closure of our Sæby slaughterhouses in 2023 and ringing in 2024. “
In the monetary effects of the meat manufacturer in 2024, the Danish crown declared a turnover of 67. 8 billion Danish ($ 9. 4 billion), which shows stagnation at 67. 6 billion Danish crowns of 2023.
Net profit fell by 28. 5%, from DKK 1. 4 billion in 2023 to DKK 1 billion in 2024.
In 2020, Danish Crown discontinued a manufacturing and distribution agreement in China with e-commerce giant Alibaba as pork production volumes had fallen short of requirements.
It signed a contract to supply pork to one of China’s largest agri-food enterprises in 2019. Danish Crown said the deal with COFCO Meat Holdings was going to be worth $100m in 2020.
The Danish Crown has services in Denmark, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, the United Kingdom and France.
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