Good progress made with the new joint venture in Australia
- conversion of Woolworth's Bunbury facility in Western Australia on schedule
- construction of a new purpose built retail packing facility for Woolworths in Victoria recently confirmed,
with operations expected to commence in 2015
Further turnover growth achieved in Europe, reflecting new product introductions, particularly in Holland, and the recovery of higher meat input prices
Continuing weakness in consumer spending, with volume growth held back both by the higher meat prices across Europe and short term industry issues in the UK and Ireland
Growth in underlying profitability offset by initial start-up costs of £0.5m incurred for our new joint venture in Australia
Strong cash generation enabling net debt to be reduced to £1.6m (December 2012: £5.2m)
Robust balance sheet with the interim dividend increased from 3.4p to 3.65p, an increase of 7.4%
Commenting, Robert Watson OBE, Chief Executive of Hilton Food Group plc said:
"We are pleased to have achieved further growth despite challenging market conditions. Strategically we continue to make strong progress and were able to announce last month the construction of a new purpose built retail packing facility in Victoria, Australia, to be operated by our joint venture company. Our aim is to continue to extend the geographic reach of the Hilton model and we continue to look for new opportunities".
