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Britain’s biggest poultry supplier is in talks to access tens of millions of pounds in additional funding as it grapples with headwinds caused by labour shortages and the supply chain crisis.
Sky News has learnt that Boparan Holdings, which trades as 2 Sisters Food Group (2SFG) and is headed by the ‘chicken king’ Ranjit Boparan, is in advanced negotiations with several hedge funds about providing around £50m of extra liquidity to the company.
The efforts to secure new funding underline the squeeze that has been exerted on food producers amid the toxic cocktail of labour and raw material shortages, and accelerating inflation, which has been blighting major economies in recent months.
Sources close to the talks said on Friday that the talks with financiers were expected to result in a deal in the coming days.
The identities of the new funding providers is unclear, but is expected to provide additional support to 2SFG’s trading during the crucial Christmas period.
As the owner of Bernard Matthews, Mr Boparan is Britain’s biggest supplier of Christmas turkeys to supermarkets across the country, while his group also owns a number of other major food brands, such as Holland’s Pies.
Its customers include Marks & Spencer, J Sainsbury and Tesco.
Last month, Mr Boparan warned that an era of cheap food production was coming to an end, and said rising inflation was “decaying the food sector’s supply chain”.
“The days when you could feed a family of four with a £3 chicken are coming to an end. We need transparent, honest pricing. This is a reset and we need to spell out what this will mean,” he said.
Mr Boparan owns the Bernard Matthews brand
“Food is too cheap, there’s no point avoiding the issue. In relative terms, a chicken today is cheaper to buy than it was 20…
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Source : skynews
