UK-based Co-Operative Group has sold its farming business to the charitable foundation Wellcome Trust for £249 million in order to focus on its retail and consumer businesses including food, legal service, insurance, and its funeral business. The sale consists of 39,533 acres of land across 15 farms, more than 100 residential properties, and 27 commercial properties. The proceeds from the sale, which comes just three weeks after the sale of its pharmacy business for £620 million, will be used to pay down debt and for investment in the Co-op Group’s remaining businesses. Wellcome Trust funded the sequencing of the human genome, the development of frontline drugs to fight malaria, and is the second highest spending charitable foundation focusing on improvements for human and animal health. Wellcome Trust, which already owned agricultural holdings at the time of the sale states that it is ‘ideally placed to develop and grow’ its newly acquired farming business.
To receive relevant news stories with summaries provided by GAI Research & Insight, subscribe to Global AgDevelopments, our free weekly enhanced eNews service