Royal Avebe today announced its performance price of 93.30 euro for the 2020/2021 financial year. The growing acreage of starch potatoes, especially outside the Netherlands, led to pressure on the prices of native starch this year. Rising costs caused by the corona crisis also depressed the performance price. This performance price is partly due to the strategic direction following two years in which the performance price benefited from a lower market supply and therefore higher prices for native starch.
Growing year 2020 was marked by better growing conditions for starch potatoes compared to previous years. This was also the case in other European countries, where the acreage of starch potatoes also increased considerably. This higher market supply exerted downward pressure on prices for native potato starch and protein for animal feed. This ultimately resulted in a performance price of 93.30 euro. The performance price is the Cooperative’s key financial indicator. It combines the cooperative result and the potato revenues. The cooperative result totals 9.2 million euros.
Avebe benefits from increased capacity for vegetable protein
Avebe’s strategy is to create more value through innovative products rather than bulk products. In recent years, the demand for innovative, vegetable-based products has increased, and Avebe’s potato starch and protein products play a vital role in this. This is illustrated by replacing animal protein with vegetable potato protein in dairy products while retaining the same nutritional and functional value. The capacity for vegetable protein has expanded considerably in recent years. Avebe invested heavily in innovation and sustainability in the financial year 2020/2021. This included planned investments that had been postponed in the previous fiscal year due to COVID-19.
Impact of COVID-19
The coronavirus once again caused many uncertainties. The number of infections among employees rose. There was also reduced availability of transport and containers to get products from A to B. Despite that, we managed to get all the products to our customers, sometimes with some delays. The cooperative was also faced with rising costs of transport, energy, raw materials and packaging materials. David Fousert, new chairman of the board of Royal Avebe: “Our members are also facing substantial cost increases to grow starch potatoes. It is therefore imperative that we, as Avebe, remain on track to continuously increase the performance price. And we do this through our strategy for high-quality products. Despite the impact of the corona crisis and market conditions, we are still on track to achieve our strategic goals including a 100 euro performance price by the financial year 2024/2025,” said David Fousert.
