Press Release
February 16, 2014 – Lagos, Nigeria – Nigerian Breweries Plc, Nigeria’s leading brewing company, Psaltry International Company Ltd, a Nigerian cassava processing company, and the International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC), through its Towards Sustainable Clusters in Agribusiness through Learning in Entrepreneurship (2SCALE) project, have signed a Partnership Agreement to optimize the cassava value chain in Nigeria and improve agribusiness for Nigerian smallholder farmers.
The Partnership Agreement is a collaboration to improve the productivity of smallholder farmers and consequently support economic development as well as promote inclusive growth in Africa. The partnership will enhance farmers’ yields and increase supply of high-quality cassava roots to Psaltry who will, in turn, provide industrial quality cassava starch for Nigerian Breweries to extract maltose syrup for use in the brewing process.
The Partnership Agreement succeeds the Memorandum of Understanding signed by the partners in June 2014, which formed part of the 2SCALE program, a Dutch-funded initiative aimed at improving rural livelihoods and food security in Africa. The partners agreed to support small-scale farmers in the production of more and better cassava through technical assistance, training and easier access to finance. This will enable more smallholder farmers to participate in the market for processed cassava byproducts required for large industrial purposes.
The partnership also enhances Nigerian Breweries’ socio-economic contribution via the agricultural sector and supports the progress the company is making toward the achievement of HEINEKEN’s ambition to source locally 60 percent of its agricultural raw materials in Africa by 2020.
Nicolaas Vervelde, Managing Director of Nigerian Breweries, said, “As an operating company of HEINEKEN, we have a long-standing commitment to support local economic development and promote inclusive growth by sourcing agricultural raw materials from entrepreneurial local SMEs and utilizing them in our operations. Through our partnership with Psaltry and IFDC, we are taking a big step toward further realizing this ambition with cassava.”
From June to December 2014, 2SCALE and Psaltry created awareness and mobilized and trained over 500 direct farmers who supplied more than 20,000 tons of cassava roots to Psaltry’s processing factory. Over 2,000 direct farmers are expected to benefit from the project within the next three years. The project has also worked to ensure that women and youth are targeted to promote equity among project beneficiaries.
Oluyemisi Iranloye, Managing Director/CEO of Psaltry, stated that she is excited about the partnership because it would fast-track the growth of her young company. “It is a huge opportunity for Psaltry to buy more raw materials from the local farmers, which would ultimately transform them into commercial farmers. The partnership is also a big boost in our effort to improve the quality of life of our host community.”
According to the 2SCALE National Cluster Advisor, Thompson Ogunsanmi, “The partnership with Psaltry and Nigerian Breweries is an opportunity to take cassava farmers in Nigeria to another level based on 2SCALE’s model of inclusive growth. It is a sustainable model that enables smallholder farmers to benefit from agriculture as a profitable business.”
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Kufre Ekanem
E-mail: Kufre.ekanem@Heineken.com
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Notes to Editor
About Nigerian Breweries
Nigerian Breweries Plc. is the pioneer and largest brewing company in Nigeria. The company, a subsidiary of Heineken N.V. incorporated in 1946, commenced brewing operations in 1949 with Star, Nigeria’s first indigenous lager beer. Currently, the company’s portfolio of brands includes Star, Gulder, Heineken, Goldberg, Life Continental Lager, Legend Extra Stout, Maltina, Amstel Malta, Malta Gold, Fayrouz and Climax Herbal Energy drink, which are produced in its eight operating breweries strategically located around Nigeria.
As a socially responsible corporate organization with a good track record of corporate social initiatives in identified and strategic areas, Nigerian Breweries has over the years, been very active in supporting Nigeria’s development aspirations in line with her vision of “Winning with Nigeria.” In 1994, the Company established the Nigerian Breweries Felix Ohiwerei Educational Trust Fund with a take-off grant of N100 million to take a more active part in the funding of educational and research institutions in Nigeria. Its corporate social responsibility agenda is driven within the HEINEKEN-wide sustainability, “Brewing a Better World.”
NB requires sugar and syrup for its brewing and soft drinks production processes, some of which can be produced from cassava starch. The ambition is to source these locally to replace imports from other countries. The company already has experience in local sourcing in Nigeria with sorghum, but not yet with cassava-based products. While the company plans to source sugar produced by national and multinational agrifood producers in Nigeria, it also seeks to source part of its needs from entrepreneurial, local small and medium enterprises and through these, from local smallholder farmers.
www.NBplc.com
About HEINEKEN
HEINEKEN is a proud, independent global brewer committed to surprise and excite consumers with its brands and products everywhere. The brand that bears the founder’s family name – Heineken® – is available in almost every country on the globe and is the world’s most valuable international premium beer brand. The Company’s aim is to be a leading brewer in each of the markets in which it operates and to have the world’s most valuable brand portfolio. HEINEKEN wants to win in all markets with Heineken® and with a full brand portfolio in markets of choice. The Company is present in over 70 countries and operates more than 165 breweries. HEINEKEN is Europe’s largest brewer and the world’s third largest by volume. HEINEKEN is committed to the responsible marketing and consumption of its more than 250 international premium, regional, local and specialty beers and ciders. These include Heineken®, Amstel, Anchor, Biere Larue, Bintang, Birra Moretti, Cruzcampo, Desperados, Dos Equis, Foster’s, Newcastle Brown Ale, Ochota, Primus, Sagres, Sol, Star, Strongbow, Tecate, Tiger and Zywiec. Our leading joint venture brands include Cristal and Kingfisher. The number of people employed is over 85,000. Heineken N.V. and Heineken Holding N.V. shares are listed on the NYSE Euronext in Amsterdam. Prices for the ordinary shares may be accessed on Bloomberg under the symbols HEIA NA and HEIO NA and on the Reuter Equities 2000 Service under HEIN.AS and HEIO.AS. HEINEKEN has two sponsored level 1 American Depositary Receipt (ADR) programmes: Heineken N.V. (OTCQX: HEINY) and Heineken Holding N.V. (OTCQX: HKHHY).
Most recent information is available on HEINEKEN’s website: www.theHEINEKENcompany.com.
About 2SCALE
2SCALE (www.2scale.org) is a Dutch-funded project being implemented by a consortium composed of IFDC, International Centre for development oriented Research in Agriculture (ICRA) and Base of the Pyramid Innovation Center (BoPInc). This project aims at turning Africa’s fast-growing food market opportunities into win-win and sustainable business partnerships between African farmer-based organizations, local small- and medium-sized enterprises, local business services and input providers, banks and international firms for local sourcing, food processing, input markets, storage facilities, farming mechanization, information services and financial products. 2SCALE’s business spirit is that inclusive entrepreneurship and more productive agriculture can address Africa’s growing market demand, which is projected to triple to $1 trillion by 2030.
About Psaltry
Psaltry is a medium-sized agribusiness company incorporated in Nigeria with the objective to supply high-quality cassava starch, at a competitive cost, to food and beverage companies like Nigerian Breweries. Psaltry produces cassava on its own farmland and processes it into starch in its factory at Alayide/Wasinmi village, Oyo state. The company has also set up an outgrower scheme to source cassava from smallholder farmers in a radius of 50 km around the factory.
It aims to grow its business into an efficient and cost competitive supplier of processed cassava products. Currently, Psaltry runs a processing factory and a 400 ha nucleus farm and produces 9,000 tons of starch per year, but intends to expand this production to 24,000 ton of starch per year in 2015. To reach this capacity, more farmers need to be involved in the delivery of high quality cassava to the Psaltry factory.
