Exports boost revenues for Polish meat business

20-Apr-2018 - Last updated on 20-Apr-2018 at 15:32 GMT

Higher exports significantly contributed to the group’s increased sales

Polish meat business Gobarto has managed to increase its net sales revenues for 2017 to PLN1.769 billion (€424 million), up 21.6% compared with PLN1.454bn (€348.5m) posted last year.

Although the domestic market accounted for about 85% of Gobarto’s revenues for last year, higher exports significantly contributed to the group’s increased sales. In 2017, Gobarto exported some PLN261.5m (€62.7m) worth of products to a number of foreign markets. This represented an increase of 44.7% year-on-year, according to the group’s financial report for 2017.

“The operational profit of the group was PLN39.9m, and the EBITDA for the 12 months of 2017 was PLN70.05m, close to 9.7% year-on-year,” Dariusz Formela, president of the company’s management board, said in an accompanying letter addressed to Gobarto’s shareholders.

Exports on the rise

Gobarto said it sells its products to customers in 44 countries worldwide. The largest share of the group’s key foreign markets is located in the European Union.

In 2017, Gobarto’s leading export destinations among the EU’s member states included the Netherlands, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Hungary. These four countries generated an aggregate PLN151.4m (€36.3m) in sales last year, which translated into roughly 58% of Gobarto’s total revenue from exports. It is noteworthy that, with the exception of Germany, sales in each of these four markets were higher in 2017 than a year earlier.

In 2017, the group’s other export destinations among the member states included the UK, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Austria, Denmark, Lithuania and Slovakia, according to data from the report. In addition, Gobarto said it sells its products to China, Ukraine, as well as countries in North and South America, Asia and Africa.

Among its assets, Gobarto owns a slaughterhouse in Grąbkowo, in the country’s western region, with a capacity of about 1m head per year. The group said it produces 90,000 tonnes (t) of red meat at the Grąbkowo facility. Gobarto also runs a meat processing plant in Ciechanowiec, in north-east Poland.

The group claims to be the largest player in Poland’s red meat slaughtering, cutting and distribution industry, selling pork, beef and game meat.