By Gordon Deegan
The Co. Limerick firm Wyeth Nutritionals, which sells infant formula to markets including China last year recorded a pre-tax loss of €1.59m.
New accounts filed by Wyeth Nutritionals Ireland Ltd show that the business, part of Nestle, recorded the pre-tax loss as revenues rose by €5 million from €220.6 million to €225.6 million last year.
However, the revenues remained some way off the revenues of €313.19m recorded in 2020.
The plant in west Limerick uses a significant quantity of locally produced high quality dairy ingredients in the manufacture of a full line of nutritional products.
Wyeth Nutritionals
The pre-tax loss of €1.59 million followed a pre-tax profit of €11.84 million in 2021 – a negative swing of €13.43 million.
The business, based outside Askeaton, recorded an operating profit of €1 million and interest payments of €2.6 million resulting in the pre-tax loss.
The pre-tax loss also takes account of non-cash fixed asset impairment costs of €755,000 and non-cash depreciation costs of €23 million.
The directors state that the increase in revenues “is attributable to a mix in the product profile sold to the greater China region coupled with an increase in input costs.”
They state that “in addition to this, the overall volumes produced in 2022 have decreased by 11% compared to the previous year.”
China
The firm’s China business is not helped by a declining birth rate in China with figures last month showing that China’s fertility rate dropped to an estimated record low of 1.09 in 2022.
The country’s fertility rate has dropped despite China abandoning its one-child policy in 2016 that had been in place since 1979.
On the nutritional powder market, Bord Bia’s 2022 Annual Report states that exports from Ireland of specialised nutritional powders increased by over €100 million in 2022 to a value of approximately €760 million, up 15% on 2021 figures.
Numbers employed by the company last year reduced from 496 to 490 made up of 266 in production and 224 in sales, distribution and administration.
The firm’s salary bill totalled €50.9 million showing average pay of €103,895 per employee. Directors’ pay decreased from €871,000 to €377,000.
Wyeth Nutritionals incurred research and development costs of €11.7 million last year.
The company made a net actuarial gain on its defined pension of €93.69 million last year which strengthened the firm’s balance sheet.
Shareholder funds at the end of last year total €269.79 million that included accumulated profits of €261.05 million.