Sealord lands bumper profit after last year’s loss

MAORI co-owned fishing firm Sealord has turned around its first loss in 20 years to hook a $20.6 million profit, less than a month after cutting 111 jobs.

The Nelson- and Auckland-based company’s profit was a marked improvement on last year’s $36.5m loss, which was the result of a failed fishing venture in Argentina.

Sealord’s first loss in 20 years saw the departure of its former chief executive Graham Stuart in March, with no dividend paid to its iwi and Japanese shareholders.

Stuart was replaced in August by Canadian-born food industry executive Steve Yung, who was previously managing director of McCain Foods in Australia and New Zealand.

This year, Sealord’s cost of sales decreased from $382m to $338m, while revenue dipped slightly to $448m.

As a result, profit for the year ended September 30 was up by 156 per cent, companies office documents said yesterday.

The annual result come less than a month after Sealord confirmed 70 factory jobs, 11 office-based jobs and another 30 contract workers were no longer required factory.

The staff learnt in September of the company’s plan to cut jobs and after consultation only 52 fulltime processors and 13 cleaners will remain.

The last day of work for most affected factory staff was expected to be January 30.

Sealord general manager fishing Doug Paulin said earlier this month the changes were necessary for the longterm health of the business.

‘‘This is a difficult time for our people and we are supporting them as much as we can, ‘‘ he said.

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The Vickerman St factory would remain open and the focus would be on processing fresh fish for Australasia and frozen whole fish for the China market instead of frozen commodity products.

‘‘This allows us to keep a number of our permanent wetfish employees and also continue to offer seasonal work to more than 100 other people in the Nelson region, ‘‘ Paulin said.

While Sealord had delivered a profit for 2014, challenges of rising costs, flat white fish pricing and a high exchange rate meant the focus on commodity products could not continue, he said..