French grain trader Soufflet says 2020-21 among toughest years

A poor harvest last year and the COVID-19 pandemic hit French agri-food group Soufflet’s annual results, it said Oct. 20, with its agriculture and trading businesses suffering most.

Sales in 2020-21 fell over six per cent to 4.62 billion euros (US$5.37 billion) from the previous financial year. The group did not give other financial details.

“The past fiscal year has been probably one of the most difficult in a long time given both the health crisis and the poor harvest,” Jean-Michel Soufflet, chief executive of the family-owned firm, said in a statement on the company website.

“The consequences of this context on our results are significant,” he added.

The Soufflet family agreed to sell the company to co-operative group InVivo earlier this year in a deal estimated at 2.3 billion euros (US$2.7 billion), as the French rivals look to create one of Europe’s biggest agricultural businesses.

France’s 2020 grain harvest, hit by poor weather, was worse than expected, while the pandemic crisis lasted longer than anticipated and had a more significant impact on the group’s activities, the CEO said.

Soufflet’s grain exports from the port of Rouen totalled 1.65 million tonnes last season, down from 2.4 million in 2019-20, while loadings at the port of La Pallice totalled 1.40 million tonnes in 2020-21, down from 1.93 million in the previous season, it said.

“After a record year, the poor French soft wheat harvest in 2020 had a strong impact on French exports and those of Soufflet Negoce. This decline was partially offset by exports from Ukraine and Bulgaria,” where the group has branches, it said.

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