NIGERIA – BUA Foods, the newly formed food processing and marketing arm of one of Nigeria’s leading manufacturing conglomerates, BUA Group, has received an approval to list on the Main Board of The Nigerian Exchange (NGX).

According to the company’s press-statement, the approval was attained after satisfying the listing requirements of The Exchange.

To this end, a total of 18 billion ordinary shares of the company were listed at N40.00 per share under the Consumer Goods sector of NGX, with the trading symbol, BUAFOODS.

The listing by introduction means that the shares of existing BUA Foods’ shareholders has been listed without an additional public sale of shares. Henceforth, all BUA Foods shareholders will be free to trade their shares on the Exchange.

Commenting on the listing, Abdul Samad Rabiu, CON, Chairman of BUA Group said, “I am delighted that yet another member of BUA Group has been listed on the NGX.

“This shows our commitment to national economic growth and support for the food security drive of the nation in alignment with global sustainability goals.”

Late last year, the manufacturing giant restructured its business and consolidated all its food operations i.e., BUA Sugar Refinery Limited, BUA Oil Mills Limited, IRS Flour, IRS Pasta and BUA Rice Limited.

Formation of the juggernaut BUA Foods is aimed to boost its competitive edge in the Nigerian food manufacturing sector dominated by the likes of Dangote Industries and Flour Mills of Nigeria who recently acquired Honeywell Flour Mills.

“The listing today marks a new beginning for a company playing a critical role in the FMCG industry, one that’s highly committed to nourishing lives with all our product offerings.

“The listing resonates with our commitment to sustainable growth as we nourish and enrich the lives of consumers by delivering high quality products at competitive prices.

“This listing creates an avenue for everyone to be a part of the success story of BUA Foods and benefit from the growth opportunities ahead,” said Acting Managing Director, BUA Foods, Engr. Ayodele Abioye.

BUA Group heavily invests in food industry

For over three decades, the company has maintained an unbroken streak of year-on-year growth, establishing ultra-modern production facility across multiple locations undertaking sugar, flour, pasta products, edible oils, and rice processing.

Under its flour milling operations, the company has entered into an agreement with Milleral, a Turkish manufacturer and installer of milling equipment, to build a new flour milling plant with a total milling capacity of 2,400 tons per day.

The plant will bring BUA’s total installed flour milling capacity to 4,000 tons per day. It currently operates an installed flour milling capacity of 1,600 tons per day.

The deal was closely followed by an agreement with Italian maker of pasta production equipment, FAVA spa to install a new pasta processing plant.

The new plant will have a total processing capacity of 720 tons per day of pasta across 5 lines, complementing the food processor’s already existing 720 tons/day pasta processing plant in Port Harcourt, bringing its total installed pasta processing capacity to 1,440 tons per day across 10 lines.

BUA Group has also been on the lead supporting Nigeria’s backward integration program, expanding its sugar-refining capacity from 1.5 million to 1.7 million metric tonnes through its vertically integrated sugar facility in Lafiagi in Kwara State, Nigeria.

LASUCO, a first of its kind in Nigeria, is an integrated milling factory that will comprise of a 20,000 hectares plantation, 2,200,000 tons sugar milling plant and a 200,000 tons per annum sugar refinery that will process and refine white sugar.

The facility will also have an ethanol plant that should produce 25 million litres of ethanol annually and a 35-megawatt power plant that will produce renewable energy from bagasse – sugarcane residue.

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