December 8, 2022

By Lynda Kiernan-Stone, Global AgInvesting Media

Oxley Capital Partners has been retained by a consortium of pig farming families to manage the sale of Riverbend Pork Group – one of the largest pork producers in Eastern Australia – through an offering given the name Project Fork. 

Structured as a corporate advisory and investment firm, Sydney-based Oxley Capital was created by Gunn Agri Partners as an independent subsidiary in 2019. The firm is an independent corporate advisory and investment firm specializing in agricultural assets and raising alternative forms of debt and equity capital with family-owned and corporate food and ag operations along the supply chain.

Looking to either bring on a new equity partner or sell the business in its entirety, the Salisbury, Taylor, Anderson, Fisher, and Whitby families are inviting offers through Oxley Capital for this established, integrated, and geographically diverse pork enterprise – the third-largest on Australia’s east coast behind Riverlea and Sunpork.

“It could be a full exit for the existing shareholders or an investor could come in and recapitalize the business and keep the current shareholders on to manage the business,” Ben Craw, managing director, Oxley Capital, told AFR. “There is also the potential for a sale-and-leaseback deal.”

Established six years ago, the business comprises:

~ 12 owned freehold farms spanning 1,038 hectares across Queensland (home to 27 percent of the country’s total pig herd) and northern New South Wales, providing biosecurity risk mitigation. 

~ Six additional  leased farms and contracts with 20 more.

~ A total network of 100,000 pigs, including the breeding and growing of 9,700 sows.

~ Independent, certified accreditation with in-house veterinarian and nutritionist monitoring animal welfare and development. Pigs are housed in temperature-controlled, free-roaming shelters, with computer-controlled feeding stations dispensing the correct feed for each sow’s weight, age, and stage of pregnancy, according to the company. Sow births are closely supervised in specially equipped rooms, and then go on to suckle their piglets for up to four weeks, at which time the litters are moved to warmed rooms where they are housed in large groups with their littermates. 

~ Diverse and growing distribution channels for both the domestic and export markets with a focus on whole carcasses.

Certified under the Australian Pig Industry Quality (APIQ) program, the business has the ability to deliver approximately 4,500 on a weekly basis, according to Craw.

Australia generally produces about 5.5 million pigs, or 438,000 tons of pork per year.

The value of the country’s pork market exceeds A$5.3 billion (US$3.6 billion) per year, however, the vast majority of this value is generated on the domestic market, with the export market representing a value of $149 million in 2021. Of these exports, 30 percent of the total goes to Singapore, with the Philippines, Papua New Guinea, and New Zealand ranging from 12-15 percent, and Vietnam and Hong Kong rounding out the destinations.

As we approach 2023, the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service predicts in a report released in September 2022 that pork consumption in Australia will be 620,000 tons – nearly steady from consumption of 623,000 tons this year, due in part, to pork’s comparatively lower prices to beef. 

Interested parties are advised that non-binding indicative offers (NBIOs) for “Project Fork” are due to Oxley Capital Partners by Monday, December 19, 2022. 

~ Lynda Kiernan-Stone is editor in chief with GAI Media, and is managing editor and daily contributor for Global AgInvesting’s AgInvesting Weekly News and  Agtech Intel News, as well as HighQuest Group’s Unconventional Ag. She can be reached at lkiernan-stone@globalaginvesting.com.

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