Cargill Philippines Inc. (Cargill) said on Thursday it would rather focus on the domestic poultry sector than ship chicken overseas as the Philippine market offers better growth prospects.
“There is potential in the domestic market if you think about it. The export market, is it necessary for us? Not at all,” Cargill President Philip G. Soliven told reporters in a news briefing in Makati City on Thursday.
“The market here in the Philippines is attractive and big. Domestic investment is as good as export,” Soliven added.
Last year Cargill Joy Poultry Meats Production Inc., a joint venture between Cargill and Jollibee Foods Corp., inaugurated the country’s largest poultry-processing plant in Batangas. It has an annual capacity of 45 million chickens.
“If we decide to undertake another investment in the poultry sector…it would be for the domestic market first, and then we’ll see if there is potential in exports,” he said.
Soliven added they are currently studying a “broad spectrum” of potential areas in the country for their next investment. The company is set to make an investment decision this year.
“The decision to go with one would likely result in a production facility, but we haven’t quite completed the decision process yet on where the specific investment [would be],” he said.
“Opportunity exists today; you don’t want to spend too much time waiting to make a decision. We will make an investment decision this year, but whether it would be bigger than last year, we don’t know yet,” Soliven added.
Furthermore, the Cargill chief also disclosed that the company is looking to invest in the Visayas-Mindanao area despite security concerns.
“We are aware of security concerns, we don’t ignore them. But for agriculture, Mindanao is an important region,”
Soliven said the company’s growth averaged 11 percent in the past 10 years. He added that the firm’s consolidated sales in fiscal year 2016-2017, which ended on May 31, 2017, reached P27 billion.