Financial/operational highlights

Highlights – for the half year ended 30 November 2011

Financial

• Revenue up 29.6% to £263.7 million (H1 2010: £203.4 million)
• Operating profit £2.4 million (H1 2010: £3.2 million)
• Profit before taxation down 18.2% to £1.8 million (H1 2010: £2.2 million)
• Basic earnings per share down 12.5% to 2.8p (H1 2010: 3.2p)
• Interim dividend per share unchanged at 1.0p (H1 2010: 1.0p)
• Net debt £29.3 million (30 November 2010: £17.1 million)
• Refinanced £55.0 million banking facilities to October 2015

Operational

Feeds

Revenue increased by 23.9% to £60.1 million (H1 2010: £48.5 million) as a result of increase prices. Operating profit of £0.6 million is in line with expectations in spite of good grazing conditions against a record prior period of £1.5 million when gains were made on forward raw material purchases. Market share gains have been delivered with particular success in blends.

Food

Revenue increased by 2.7% to £22.9 million (H1 2010: £22.3 million). Operating profits were a record £1.8 million compared to £1.0 million in the prior year. This resulted from a number of initiatives including increased backloads and more efficient operations. Demand continued to be volatile and overflow warehousing was utilised as storage was at capacity during the period.

Fuels

Revenue increased by 36.3% to £180.7 million (H1 2010: £132.6 million) as a consequence of higher crude oil prices and the acquisitions successfully completed in the last twelve months. Operating profit was at breakeven (after £0.3 million acquisition and integration costs) compared to £0.7 million in the prior year. Volumes were up 18.2% to 201 million litres (H1 2010: 170 million litres). The division made a significant 42 million litre bolt-on acquisition at the end of September adding 10% to volume and enhancing NWF's depot network.