IDM ¦ Editorial
How big is this pandemics
influence?
M&A activies are a fever thermometer
According to Rabobank figures, worldwide M&A activities in the dairy sector have slowed down
significantly during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic. Only 80 such transactions were reported
during the whole of last year – a 25% backlog compared to the previous year.
This development is not at all surprising. The various lockdowns have turned the markets for dairy
products virtually upside down. What used to be one of the main pillars of the business, food
service and catering, stopped ordering overnight for a long period. And sales in the retail channel
suddenly boomed as a result. Dairy companies were kept more than busy making changes to production,
packaging and distribution, and there was simply too little time for negotiating a business
deal like a merger or an acqusition. Not to mention the general insecurity that concerned management
in the wake of the pandemic.
As 2021 brought at least some ease to the situation, M&A activities rapidly came back to approaching
a normal level. During the first six months of this year, not less than 50 such activities were
reported worldwide. M&A is a direct measure of how well an economy works and we now have
to wait and see how markets and the economy will develop further. Has the industry already overcome
all the negative consequences of pandemic or will the virus keep on influencing the business
in some way or another? It might be a bit too early for a definitive statement, thinks Roland Sossna.
Roland Sossna
Editor IDM
International Dairy Magazine
sossna@blmedien.de
international-dairy.com
4 · September/October 2021 ¦ international-dairy.com
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