Black River Capital Partners Fund, a division of agricultural services conglomerate Cargill, acquired a stake in Philippines-based agro-commercial company AgriNurture (ANI) worth 28% yesterday, paying about $30.5m.
The move comes two weeks after Antonio L. Tiu, chief executive of ANI, announced the postponement of its own acquisitions timetable to Filipino newspaper BusinessWorld. Tiu stated that ANI was to scale back its acquisitions to one food chain in 2011, with further deals for as yet unnamed food or beverage chains set for the first quarter of this year.
ANI previously obtained about $6m in equity, in October, from seven unnamed investors, two months after it acquired 51% of fruit juice chain The Big Chill. Part of the funding received from Cargill will be used to expand The Big Chill’s activities internationally, including into the US where Cargill is situated.
This followed a sale of stake of around 6% to investors including offshore firm Southern Fields, in April, for about $2.5m.
ANI has disclosed additional expansion plans in the past few months including up to $4.5m to be allocated towards building up its farm base in Asia over the next three years, concentrating on rice and corn.