Nutreco invests in Nigeria farm growth
THE feed group Nutreco has acquired 100 percent ownership of Skretting Nigeria, which has until now been a joint venture with the shareholders of local fish farming operation Durante.
With a fast growing population that is already in excess of 180 million people, and a tradition of eating fish, Nigeria offers considerable potential for aquaculture growth.
Furthermore, the government has increased its support of the industry in recent years by reducing the importation of frozen fish into the country.
Together, these circumstances have encouraged farmers to both ramp up their production and also diversify from culturally important catfish farm- ing into producing tilapia.
To aid the West African country’s advancement, Skretting has built a strong foothold in the market over the last 12 years; principally by helping local producers overcome the industry’s major challenge of securing access to the high quality feeds that will allow fish farmers to get their products to the size that consumers want.
Some three years ago, this commitment was further augmented through the establishment of the Skretting Nigeria fish feed business and a new feed plant in Ibadan.
‘While Nigeria has endured some economic challenges in the last couple of years, we believe that with Skretting Nigeria becoming wholly owned by Nutreco, the market will have the further reassurance that we are committed to the development of the Nigerian aquaculture industry,’ said Rob Kiers, managing director of Skretting Africa.
Seyi Adeleke-Ige, general manager of Skretting Nigeria, said: ‘We wanted to produce the feeds here in Nigeria so that they would be readily available to local farmers. That has been the focus of Skretting Nigeria over the past three years and the five-fold increase in our production in that time to more than 20,000 tonnes shows that it was the correct strategy. Today, the market is growing quickly and that is attracting a lot of investors to the industry.’