From its poultry meat production and processing businesses in Australia and New Zealand, Inghams Group reports it has achieved its second-highest half-year earnings since 2016.
For the first six months of its 2025 financial year, total revenue was more than 1.61 billion Australian dollars (AUD; US$1.02 billion).
“Overall, the business is performing well, and today’s results confirm the company remains on track to achieve its FY2025 volume and earnings guidance provided at the FY2024 results in August 2024,” said Inghams’ CEO and managing director, Andrew Reeves.
Reeves highlighted the firm’s progress in regaining sales lost as a result of reduced volume following a new supply agreement with leading retailer, Woolworths.
He said the company had explored new business through retail and quick service restaurant channels. During the half-year, this compensated for around three-quarters of the volume lost as result of the new Woolworths contract. Reeves expects further progress over the coming months.
Headline results for FY2025
Compared with the same period last year, Inghams Group reports Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization (EBITDA) for the first half of the current fiscal year (FY2025) down 17% at AUD210.4 million.
Adjusted for changes in the Australian accounting model regarding leases (AASB 16), underlying EBITDA for the period was AUD124 million. At AUD138.4 million, the figure for comparable period in 2024 was easily the highest figure achieved by the company since it went public in 2016.
Changes in the company’s business related to the supply agreement with Woolworth, and the resulting shift in sales channels drove a 1% increase in overall net selling price to AUD6.34 per kilo. Main contribution to this development was Bostock Brothers, a New Zealand business acquired by Inghams during its FY2024.
At AUD1.61 billion, revenue for the latest six-month period was 1.9% lower year-on-year. This was attributed by the company mainly to a 2.7% dip in core poultry volume, which was reported to be 234,200 metric tons (mt).
Costs of production were 0.9% lower than in the first half of FY2024, partly as a result of the implementation of a range of operational efficiencies and cost management measures. However, operating costs were raised by the conversion of around 100 of the firm’s poultry growers to variable performance-based contracts over the past one-and-a-half years.
Expansion in New Zealand, dip in Australia
Of the group’s total core poultry production of 234,200mt in the first half of FY2025, its Australian business generated 196,400mt, a drop of 4.1% from the same period the previous year. Although net selling price was 1.6% higher at AUD6.42 per kilo, underlying EBITDA was down 8.5% year-on-year at AUD100.6 million.
Core poultry volume produced by the company’s New Zealand operations was 5% higher year-on-year at 37,800mt, and net selling price was up 0.6% at NZD6.53 per kilo. Compared with the same period of the previous year, underlying EBITDA for this business was down 17.8% at AUD23.4 million.
More on Inghams Group
Production of 229 million birds puts Inghams Group into the leading position among the poultry meat producers in Oceania, according to WATTPoultry.com’s Top Poultry Companies survey for 2023. Key product categories are chicken and turkey.
In December, the company announced that Andrew Reeves is to step down as CEO. Appointed his successor from mid-2025 is chief executive of the group’s New Zealand business, Ed Alexander.
Acquisition of Bostock Brothers of New Zealand by Inghams Group was announced around one year ago. At that time, Bostock Brothers was the country’s only certified producer of organic chicken.
