NETHERLANDS: Food bucks falling sales at DSM

By: just-food.com | 24 February 2010

Food and nutrition has continued to buck a trend of falling revenues at Dutch conglomerate DSM.

The company, which makes ingredients across sectors, including dairy, beverage and savoury, reported a 1.8% rise in revenues from its nutrition business to EUR716m (US$970.1m) for the last three months of 2009.

Group turnover fell 4% to EUR2.02bn in the fourth quarter of the year.

Operating profit from DSM's nutrition division fell from EUR155m in the fourth quarter of 2008 to EUR137m in 2009. DSM said its nutrition business benefited from "non-recurring items" in the fourth quarter of 2008.

Fourth-quarter operating profit across DSM jumped 68% to EUR141m.

However, DSM said its nutrition unit had grown its operating profit by 17% to EUR521m, while sales rose 4% to EUR2.82bn.

Group operating profit fell 52% to EUR370m in 2009; sales fell 15% to EUR7.87bn.

Chairman Feike Sijbesma praised the performance of DSM's business throughout 2009.

"A continued robust performance from the Nutrition business and the benefits of our early actions to improve our competitive position contributed to this performance," Sijbesma said.

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