Bounty Fresh expects higher local output following buyout of NZ poultry producer

MANILA, Philippines — Bounty Fresh Food Inc. expects its acquisition of New Zealand’s largest poultry producer Tegel to further improve local production.

“New Zealand is the cleanest country as far as chicken production is concerned. We want to learn from them so we always go out and see what the bet practices and technologies are and bring them home,” said Theresa Chen, senior vice president for sales at Bounty Fresh on the sidelines of 2018 World Chicken and Egg Day yesterday.

“We’re going out of our comfort zone. We want to challenge ourselves,” she told The STAR.

Bounty Fresh received regulatory approvals for its $309 million acquisition of the Tegel Group. It now owns 96.11 percent of Tegel.

Without going into details, Chen hinted at the possibility of importing its products over the near term but said that meeting local demand is still the company’s priority.

Chen said the company is looking to import its products to Indonesia.

Despite the increasing prices of other commodities, Chen said Bounty Fresh has maintained its price and continues to see “healthy” growth this year in terms of sales.

“We always keep our price as low as possible because we want everyone to eat chicken and eggs on a daily basis,” she said.

“The demand is very healthy, the population is increasing and more people are actually eating (chicken),” Chen added.

Bounty Fresh was founded in the 1980s by businessman Tennyson Chen who started the business in a one-layer house in Sta. Maria, Bulacan with an initial 5,000 heads of chicken.

From a 5,000-head layer farm, the business grew to be one of the largest broiler integrators in the country.

Today, it is the only fully-integrated poultry firm that has continuously invested in company-owned facilities.

Bounty Fresh is the first company in the Philippines to put up a single-stage commercial broiler hatchery, a technology that ensures better hatchery sanitation with controlled ventilation, which in turn will produce better chick quality.

To cater to the consumers in the various regions and islands of the archipelago, Bounty Agro Ventures Inc. was integrated to operate in several branches across the country. It is now one of the largest poultry companies in the Philippines with vertically integrated farm-to-plate operations.