Agro, food to spearhead Betagro

The consolidation started at the beginning of this year.

Narongchai Srisantisaeng, chief operating officer of the food business, said yesterday that the reshuffle will support the group’s strategy to align all businesses clearly in the same direction. 

Enterprise resource planning software has been employed to sharpen efficiency and competitiveness. 

The new integrated business management package will allow Betagro to collect, store, manage and interpret data from many activities, including product planning and purchasing, manufacturing or service delivery, marketing and sales, inventory management, as well as shipping and payment.

“We are also setting up our first food innovation centre located at the group’s head office in the North Park venue on Vibhavadi-Rangsit Road in Bangkok. 

“The centre, which will be opened by the end of this year, will be in charge of the development of new food product and packaging initiatives to be in line with the real demand of today’s consumers. 

“It will help promote the development of food knowledge and technical information as well as provide the right solutions to any problems raised by individual consumers in the food business group,” he said.

Founded in 1967 with registered capital of only Bt10 million, it produced and distributed animal feed. Its head office was located in Prom Prab in Bangkok with its first feedmill in Samut Prakan’s Phra Pradaeng district.

The group has grown from strength from strength, beginning with the establishment |of its first animal husbandry facility in Nakhon Ratchasima’s Pak Chong district, comprising poultry and swine farming, a feedmill and hatchery. 

It was followed by the company’s expansion into the strategically located and resource-rich province of Lop Buri. 

There, comprehensive production facilities that included feed production, a hatchery, poultry and swine-raising, fresh and frozen chicken-processing, hygienic pork-processing and frozen SPF pork product-processing, were soon to position Betagro as a leading conglomerate in Thailand’s agro industry. Betagro posted Bt25 billion in revenues in the first quarter of this year, of which Bt8 billion was from the agro business and Bt17 billion from the food business. 

This was similar to the same quarter of last year, but the group expects its whole-year revenue to reach about Bt100 billion, of which Bt33 billion will come from agribusiness and Bt67 billion from food. Revenue was Bt96 billion last year. 

“We are expecting tremendous growth from food rather than agribusiness, which is in line with the group’s strategy to add value to our food products, rather than sell live animals,” he said.

Betagro exports its food products to more than 30 markets around the world, including Japan, England, Hong Kong, Scandinavia and Europe. 

The group plans to penetrate new overseas markets, focusing on the Middle East, neighbouring countries in Asean and South Africa.

“We want to strengthen Betagro’s current positioning and market share to be among the top three chicken manufacturers and exporters in Thailand,” he said.

The group will increase the sales contribution from its own-brand products – Betagro, the group’s standard brand for food products, and S-Pure, the premium brand, which will also become two flagship brands to penetrate the local market and for exporting into the region and other potential markets around the world. 

However, 97 per cent of the group’s food business is still dominated by OEM (original equipment manufacturing) for other brands. 

“We plan to increase the sales contribution from our own brands from currently only 2-3 per cent to about 5 per cent in three years,” he said. 

“They [own-brand products] will be further promoted into regional brands to penetrate the AEC [Asean Economic Community] markets,” he added.