Good morning and welcome to Inghams Full Year 2022 Results Presentation. If you are logged in to the online platform, please submit your questions at any time via the messaging tab. If you have dialed in and would like to ask a question, please dial star one to enter the questions queue. I will now hand over to Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Inghams, Andrew Reeves.
Thank you and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. As noted, my name is Andrew Reeves, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Inghams, and it's my pleasure to welcome you to Inghams 2022 Annual Results Presentation. On behalf of Inghams, I would like to respectfully acknowledge the traditional owners, both past and present, as custodians of the land we are meeting on today. Joining me for today's presentation is our Chief Financial Officer, Gary Mallett. At the conclusion of the formal presentation, we will take any questions you may have on our results and the business. FY 2022 was a challenging year, marked by major operational disruptions caused by a variety of different events and factors throughout the year, some of which have lessened in effect, while some remain ongoing.
Importantly, our business has been recovering from the worst effects of the Omicron wave experienced in the third quarter. Employee attendance levels have improved, and our operations are progressively returning to normal operating patterns and levels, so too is our channel mix. As you will see later in the presentation, average selling prices have meaningfully recovered since this time. I'm pleased to be able to report that we're achieving good price increases across all channels and customers. With increases we have achieved in New Zealand contributing to FY 2022, while Australian price increases will make a meaningful contribution in FY 2023. Due to the commercially sensitive nature of our pricing discussions, I'm not able to provide specific detail on the rate of price growth we're achieving.
Suffice to say that while there is some lag in these price increases taking effect, we are achieving increases that reflect our cost inflation environment. Discussions remain ongoing with all customers should we need to seek further increases. We have spoken often of our operational efficiency program. While COVID impacts temporarily slowed our progress on the implementation of new initiatives, the program continues to deliver strong results and is expected to be an ongoing contributor to our future financial results. Overall, despite all that the business and our people have endured in the past year, Inghams has a strong long-term outlook and the fundamentals of the poultry market and the business overall remain intact. Turning now to an overview of the business and an update on the financial year.
As many of you know, Inghams is the largest integrated protein producer across Australia and New Zealand, providing chicken, turkey and plant-based protein products to major retail, quick service restaurants, food service distributors, and wholesalers. Our diverse network provides us with a number of important advantages, including no poultry products can be imported into Australia with the exception of certain fully cooked items from New Zealand. We provide a local supply through a network of regional operating facilities, and we fully service national and local customer requirements. This network helps us mitigate agricultural risk and manage feed price volatility, excuse me, and manage biosecurity and operational risk. It gives us the optionality and flexibility for future growth. Inghams operations are vertically integrated and hard to replace.
Aside from the obvious barriers to entry that this creates, there are other important benefits that we derive from this model. By effectively controlling all elements of production, we are able to realize efficiencies across all aspects of our supply chain, which you can see being realized throughout the years of our continuous improvement strategy and process. Following from this, we are able to ensure we achieve the appropriate production balance in our operations, which combined with operational excellence, are keys to growing margins over time. I'd like to spend a moment outlining the case for poultry. We are seeing quite a significant acceleration in inflation in recent times, the result of a variety of simultaneous, yet somewhat independent domestic and international factors.
Against this backdrop, the long-standing affordability of poultry, we believe, is an important factor that will underpin future growth, demand growth for the sector. As you can see from the chart on the left, chicken consumption has been steadily growing for the better part of the last 60 years. With significant pricing differentials that continue to be observed, as shown in the chart on the right, we believe the poultry sector is well-placed to deliver future growth. The health and versatility benefits of poultry are well-established, which aligns very well with the ongoing trends and consumer preferences for healthier lifestyle options. The third element underpinning the future of the industry is the sustainability of chicken.
With a carbon footprint that is estimated to be around five times smaller than red meat, chicken is the green animal protein, and this will continue to be important additional underpinning for the sector as we go into the future. FY 2022 was characterized by a number of impactful events, including the ongoing effects of COVID-19, the effects of geopolitical events from the third quarter onwards on feed and fuel costs, and of course, global supply chain disruptions. The effects of broad-based inflation in Australia and New Zealand are well reported, and while our operational efficiency programs are helping to offset some of the inflation impact, they alone are not sufficient to fully offset these pressures. Over the course of the year, we saw an industry-wide volume shift to the wholesale channel, which was caused by an oversupply of chicken and therefore a significant price decline in the channel.
I'm pleased to say that we have seen a strong recovery in wholesale prices during Q4 as processing normalized. Pleasingly, we have made good progress in securing price increases during FY 2022, with New Zealand prices increasing from FY 2022 and contributing FY 2022 and future Australian and New Zealand increases to contribute throughout FY 2023. Our capital position remains strong, with net debt increasing modestly during FY 2022 to AUD 267 million, which is broadly in line with our first half 2022 position. A good result, given the softer second half trading. Due to our lower overall EBITDA in FY 2022, this has meant leverage has increased to 2x the top of our target range. A final dividend of AUD 0.005 per share has been declared, which reflects the reduced second half profitability.
Including the interim dividend paid early this year, this equates to an FY 2022 payout of 61.6%, which is within our policy range. As noted in my opening remarks, the business was faced with a variety of significant operational disruptions caused by events largely outside our control. While the effect of some of these has lessened and many remain ongoing in some shape or form, the recovery is underway. The effect of many of these ongoing issues has been to significantly increase the cost of doing business. To counter these effects on profitability, I'm pleased to say that we are achieving good price increases across our customer base. Our operations are progressively returning to normal operating levels and full product range production.
I would note that there remains some ongoing variability in our operational tempo due to ongoing supply chain disruptions and labor availability issues, and we continue to work through these. The cost environment is challenging and is a challenging one for all businesses, and our costs remain elevated, mainly driven by feed and transport. Our continuous improvement programs continue to provide some offset to these pressures. Overall, the key message is that our operations and channels are recovering. Taking a look at prices, the following charts give a clearer picture of the core poultry average selling prices during FY 2022. As you can see from the group chart on the left, ASP declined quite significantly during the third quarter, driven by Omicron-related channel and product mix changes.
The significant industry-wide increase in supply to the wholesale channel due to the temporary rationalization of usual retail SKUs, resulted in a large price decline in this channel, which, together with the mix change, impacted our overall ASP. Our ASP has recovered strongly since then, increasing 6.6% between January and June as a result of both improvements in channel mix, the significant price recovery in wholesale, and price increases achieved with customers. As noted in the previous slide, significant price increases are being achieved across all channels and customers. As you know, there are a lot of moving parts to FY 2022. I don't propose to go through each individual item in detail. However, the following slides breaks down the year in more detail for you to look at the different, quite distinct periods we faced during the year.
The first half was defined by a challenging operating environment characterized by extended lockdowns and significant operational disruptions caused by pandemic conditions, with the results achieved being broadly in line or ahead of the first half of the prior corresponding period. Moving into the second half of FY 2022, the third quarter saw a confluence of well-known factors to make this our most challenging period. The fourth quarter has been one of recovery, and while conditions have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels, conditions have nonetheless improved greatly from the earlier in this calendar year. Turning now to look at the channels in FY 2022. As you'll note from the volume chart on this slide, there were two key changes that occurred in our channels during the year. Retail volumes declined slightly and wholesale volumes grew significantly.
In retail, the impact of COVID-19 restrictions on processing and production capabilities and changes to consumer behaviors during the year resulted in some decline in volume, with lower foot traffic and higher online sales impacting demand for roast chickens. In New Zealand, strict lockdowns meant less frequent, larger shops which impacted sales. While first half results were stronger as restrictions were lifted, the effect of the Omicron wave on operations also resulted in some channel mix shift to wholesale, as noted earlier. In QSR, Australian volume increased compared to prior period, reflecting the effect of COVID-19 restrictions on customer demand at various times during the period. Demand was noted as improving during Q4, supported by new product launches and promotions. New Zealand QSR demand was softer due to government-imposed operating restrictions, resulting in trading largely ceasing during the first half.
The food service channel recorded modest volume growth, with demand improving as restrictions eased and domestic travel activity resumed, resulting in stronger channel growth in regional centers. New Zealand demand growth was also stronger during the period. The wholesale channel, which has quite a diverse customer profile, saw a significant increase in industry-wide volume during the year. A combination of softer demand across other channels in the first half, followed by the impact of processing constraints in Q3, saw a sharp increase in supply from all producers to this channel, depressing wholesale prices for much of the year. Prices have recovered strongly in Q4 as supply levels have continued to normalize. Volumes in the export channel grew, cycling prior corresponding period export restrictions due to the avian influenza outbreak and clearance of frozen inventory.
I'll now hand over to Gary to present the financial results in further detail. Thanks, Gary.
Thank you, Andrew, and good morning, everyone. All financial data presented here today is inclusive of AASB 16 adjustments, unless we have stated otherwise. In the appendix to this presentation, you'll find additional information and reconciliations that provide some additional detail on the results we are presenting today. Turning to our profit and loss for the year. As noted earlier, the group recorded core poultry volume growth of 4.2%, driven by a 5.2% increase in Australian volumes, with growth primarily in the wholesale channel. Revenue growth was more modest at 1.7%, reflecting a fall in average selling price from an unfavorable product mix and a channel mix shift to wholesale in Australia during the COVID-19 Omicron wave, as Andrew discussed. Wholesale was in oversupply and had significantly lower pricing in the third quarter.
This was partially offset by other customer price increases in both Australia and New Zealand. The group delivered statutory EBITDA of AUD 370 million, representing a decline of 17% on FY 2021, while statutory NPAT was AUD 35 million versus the PCP of AUD 83 million. In addition to COVID-19 disruptions, cost inflation was a factor in the second half. The price impact of feed was an additional AUD 45 million cost for FY 2022. Our operational efficiency programs made a positive contribution during the year, especially in the first half. However, there was some disruption to progress on implementation due to the operational challenges in the second half. This year, statutory EBITDA includes AUD 10 million of costs incurred in relation to our multi-year business process and IT transformation project.
There was a low effective tax rate as we received an AUD 8.5 million R&D tax credit this year relating to a prior period, and also benefited from the part reversal of the provision from a historical tax matter that was settled. Turning now to the balance sheet. I'm pleased to report that our balance sheet was well controlled against the backdrop of softer trading conditions during the second half. Total inventories increased during the year by AUD 56 million due to an increase of AUD 47 million in the value of feed materials on hand, while poultry inventory decreased by AUD 13 million. Feed inventory reflects both the higher price of feed and higher volumes of grain on hand due to procuring directly from growers during the period. Direct grower purchases were part of our feed supply, delivering a benefit compared to procuring from other sources.
Group's payables balance has also increased, partly from an increase in the inventory procurement trade payable related to these direct grower grain purchases. Our AASB 16 right-of-use assets continued to decline as expected in line with lease periods. Our net debt at period end has increased AUD 27 million on the prior year. However, pleasingly, it is in line with December 2021, despite the softer second half trading results. Moving now to cash flow. Our cash conversion ratio was broadly in line with the PCP at 102%. This outcome reflecting a focus on working capital management during the year. Capital expenditure was AUD 62 million, which was 7% lower than the PCP, reflecting capital discipline as the business navigated the challenges of COVID-19 and the related project delays and supply chain disruptions.
Key expenditure items during the year included AUD 6 million finalizing spend with the new HatchTech hatcheries in Victoria and WA. AUD 21 million on our Northern New South Wales breeder trial and AUD 6.5 million on the Auckland further processing clinical trial. The group received AUD 3.8 million in asset sales proceeds as reported at the first half, largely from the sale of the Gunnedah property in New South Wales. Now turning to our capital management outcomes. As already noted, our net debt at 30 June was AUD 267 million, with our leverage at the top end of our safe range of 2x on the back of lower second half profitability. Our sustaining capital spend this period of AUD 29 million represented 52% of depreciation.
Below the target range once again, due to ongoing COVID-19 lockdowns and delays in equipment being shipped and accessing some sites. A fully franked dividend of AUD 0.065 was declared in the first half, and as Andrew mentioned, with a final fully franked dividend of AUD half a cent per share declared today, which reflects the reduced profitability in the second half. Total dividends paid or declared for FY 2022 of AUD 0.07 per share represent a payout ratio of 61.6%, which is within our stated payout range of 60%-80% of underlying impact post AASB 16. I would now like to make some comments on the feed market. Forecasts are for another above-average wheat harvest, with key parts of Australia having a good start to the crop season following good rainfall.
Overall, prices increased for wheat and soy during the year, which is remaining elevated into FY 2023. As we had indicated previously, and as shown by the two charts on the left, feed costs have increased significantly during FY 2022, with wheat and soymeal prices at their highest levels in 10 years, as shown by the chart on the right. Since year-end, while wheat swap pricing was down slightly to around AUD 430, ABARES noted in their June report that high grain and oil seed prices are expected to persist in 2022/2023 due to a tight global supply and uncertainties around production in Ukraine and trade flows from the Black Sea region. Farming input prices have been pushed significantly, particularly for diesel, fertilizer, chemicals, and machinery, and while producers also report supply chain disruptions affecting the supply of chemicals and fertilizer.
Soy prices have risen during the first quarter of FY 2023 after stabilizing during the fourth quarter of FY 2022. Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay account for more than 50% of the world's soybean supply. They have been in drought since November last year. In addition, transport costs are a lot higher, which is on top of the CME prices shown on the chart. Almost all of Argentina, the world's top soybean oil and meal exporter, is in drought, and this is affecting production of all crops. As there is a period of time between securing the feed and it being fed to our poultry and then the poultry being processed, there is a lag before the cost is recorded in our P&L. The feeder prices shown in chart Q3 and for Q4 will largely be expensed in FY 2023.
As a result, we'll see higher feed costs recorded into FY 2023. Inghams continues to maintain forward cover between three and nine months to secure supply, which is in line with our procurement strategy. I'll now hand back to Andrew to discuss the segment performance.
Thanks, Gary. Turning now to the segment results. In Australia, while core poultry volumes increased 5% during the period, revenue growth was more modest at 1.7% due to the substantial industry-wide volume increase to wholesale channel, leading to a decline in price in this channel. External feed volumes declined 2.8% as customers transitioned supply away in preparation for the closure of our WA feed mill. Statutory EBITDA declined 16% versus the prior corresponding period to AUD 312 million. In particular, reflecting the effects of severe second half impacts from COVID-19 disruptions and global events which affected supply, selling prices, and the realization of operational efficiencies.
As discussed earlier, our Australian operations and all customer channels experienced COVID-related disruptions as the prevalence of Omicron in the community reduced labor availability and required temporary rationalization of higher value SKUs and reduced output at processing sites. In New Zealand, trading patterns were similar to Australia. However, COVID restrictions were harsher in the first half, and the impact from the Omicron variant was felt later in Q3 into Q4. Core poultry volumes declined by 2%, reflecting the impact of stricter lockdowns in the first half on retail and QSR demand, and supply and processing constraints in the second half. A reduction in external feed volumes reflects the sale of the Hamilton Mill in March 2021.
Revenue grew by 1.2% as we were successful in introducing price increases across all channels earlier in the period to help offset increasing feed costs and other inflationary pressures. I would now like to make a few comments on our progress on our sustainability initiatives. This time last year, I talked at some length about the importance Inghams places on sustainability and some of the work we have done over a long period of time to embed sustainability into our business, which has resulted in us being recognized industry leaders in water stewardship, sustainable agriculture, and sustainable food production. Our work continues, and FY 2022 has been another year of good progress with our key measures showing improvements year-over-year.
In line with our commitment to improving our sustainability disclosure and transparency reporting on our progress, we published our first TCFD report with our 2021 annual report in October last year. In which included a disclosure pathway, and we also published our new sustainability report. Our new reporting suite will be published in October, which will provide more detailed information on our ESG progress. Turning now to look at a couple of examples of our efficiency initiatives in action and provide some comments on our strategy. Our continuous improvement program has been operating in Inghams for the last several years, backed by a dedicated team which operate under the lean manufacturing rules and principles.
The team has a whole of business responsibility focused to drive accountability throughout the supply chain to identify our process improvements, cost savings, and waste elimination with the aim of lowering our overall operating costs. While some improvement opportunities are represented by large-scale projects, many others are found in simple daily activities that might otherwise be overlooked. In FY 2022, while operating conditions meant the progress in some initiatives was slow, many others continued. Importantly, the financial benefits of those programs previously implemented continued to accrue to the business. There are two initiatives of the 300+ we had identified this time last year that I briefly wanted to share with you today. The first example is a systems improvement that was made to a water jet portioning system that is used at our Murarrie primary processing facility.
The process works by scanning the meat brought into the system on a conveyor with the information analyzed and sent to the cutters, which use high pressure water to shape and cut the meat to the required weight and proportions. Our team identified an opportunity to improve yield by implementing a software enhancement, significantly improving yield and reducing wastage, which will deliver meaningful savings of around AUD 800,000 per annum. The second example I'd like to share is a process improvement that was made at our Thomastown facility. We had a process for producing chicken kits, which originally involved a two-step manual handling process, which required additional labor and time to execute. By redesigning the process, our team removed the offline element of the process, which reduced the labor requirement by half and also improved yield from the process.
The reduction in manual handling also created safety benefits. The overall financial benefit from this improvement is estimated to be approximately AUD 600,000 per annum. As I noted, these are two examples out of a far larger number of continuous improvement opportunities we continue to identify. Both initiatives highlight benefits of training and empowering our people and providing them with the appropriate tools to deliver on-the-job improvements to minimize waste and maximize output. Since I took over last year, as I've discussed with you previously, we've been reviewing and updating Inghams' strategy. I highlighted at the beginning of this presentation the poultry sector has a number of important structural underpinnings which both we and our major customers see as providing the opportunity to grow both the size and the value of the category relative to other proteins.
The opportunity exists to partner and create this new value together beyond the traditional transactional relationship model. We see significant opportunities for innovation across the product range and customer experience of poultry. Inghams is uniquely placed to have the kind of closer and more integrated relationship with our customers, which we believe is necessary to create these outcomes. We are clear on our strengths that will help create value with these partnerships, such as insight and innovation, brand investment, our network and production capabilities that support our customers' growth and a commitment to sustainability and the concept of Raised Right, which will only grow in importance. Underlying this, we will also continue to consider opportunities to improve the structure and efficiency of the network through various means, including continuous improvement, automation, and plant specialization.
Finally, we will continue to develop and transform the culture of our own business to reinforce the capabilities required to create value through a continued focus on leadership and people development. We believe this will create a platform of sustainable long-term growth through co-creating product and ranges for and with customers that are worth more and grow the profit pool, increase the distinctiveness of these products, and making ourselves a more valuable partner, supporting the growth of our customers, who are the leading players in their markets to support above-market volume and value growth for Inghams, creating the organizational workforce that can deliver this value better than any other, and ultimately improving the returns on capital required to continue to grow the business.
The poultry sector remains an attractive and growing one, underpinned by a number of significant advantages, including a large price advantage and well-established health benefits over red meat. A meaningful sustainability advantage with a carbon footprint that is five times smaller than red meat. FY 2022 has undoubtedly been a very challenging period for the business, our customers, and our consumers, as a result of prolonged COVID-related operational disruptions, ongoing inflationary pressures, and supply chain interruptions. We are making good progress on increasing our prices in response to these inflationary pressures that we're experiencing, and they will have a more meaningful contribution in FY 2023. I am pleased to say the recovery that commenced during the final quarter is ongoing. Our farming and plant operations are progressively returning to normal levels and full product range production.
Similarly, customer service levels have improved significantly since the start of the year, and we expect these to return to normal in due course. Global events and supply chain disruptions are expected to continue to place upward pressure on the price of key inputs. Feed prices are expected to remain elevated due to tight global supply as a result of continued uncertainty surrounding production in Ukraine and related trade flows, poor growing conditions in North and South America, and elevated transport costs. As noted earlier, we remain in active discussions to secure further price increases to offset ongoing feed costs and inflationary pressures should this be necessary. Our extensive continuous improvement program remains in place, and we are targeting to make meaningful progress on implementing a wide range of initiatives in the coming year.
As noted earlier in the presentation, final dividend of half cent per share that has been declared reflects reduced profitability in the second half of the year. However, it does maintain the dividend pay-payout ratio within our policy range. On behalf of the management team, I'd like to thank you for joining us today, and I'll now hand back to the operator, and we'll be happy to take any of your questions. Thank you.
Thank you. We have received a number of questions through the presentation, and we'll firstly deal with those written questions that have come through online. The first written questions are from Rob Gordon. Rob's first question is: What percentage of price increases on whole of business have been completed, and when do you expect to complete price increases?
We'll not give out the exact percentage increase because frankly that's a competitive and commercially sensitive number. I'm pleased to say that we've had discussions in Australia and New Zealand with all of our customers across all of our channels, and we largely have in place a program of price increases that is in the process of being implemented now and will be continually implemented throughout the course of the year to help us recover the cost input pressure that we're experiencing.
Thank you. Rob Gordon's next question: Do you expect price increases when completed will fully recover cost increases?
That's certainly our aim and our objective is to do that. There is some lag, as you can appreciate, between the cost impacts and when getting those prices put to bed. Of course, you've got the normal competitive pressures that take place throughout the course of any trading year. That's certainly our objective.
Robert's third question: When do you expect customer mix, wholesale, food service, retail to normalize?
Well, we're actually in the fourth quarter of FY 2022, and as we come into this first part of the trading in FY 2023, we're certainly starting to see much more normal patterns of mix and trading across those channels. That is making good progress and is, you know, well underway.
Thank you. We'll now turn to some audio questions, the first of which is from Michael Pate. Michael, please go ahead with your question.
Sorry, can you hear me?
Yes. Yep.
Got it. Sorry about that. Was on mute. Just looking at slide 18, the feed costs for the chart you've got there just suggests probably as you head into 2023, the headwind's probably a bit higher than it was in 2022. Could you just confirm the price negotiations, are you looking to recover all those costs that you can see sort of in your forward purchasing program? Or how often are you gonna have to come back to sort of get further price increases as those sort of headwinds continue through your forward purchasing program?
Yeah. Well, as I've said, you know, we've had those discussions or are having those discussions with customers. We're looking to recover as much of that as we possibly can. There will be some lag, and that program will be implemented, well, it's being implemented as we speak. It's very much a part of the current year to do that. Yeah, it's well underway.
Thank you. Our next audio question is from Craig Woolford. Craig, please go ahead with your question now.
Good morning, Andrew and Gary. Just, I got two questions. The first is just trying to understand sales mix or what you're indicating on sales mix. The table that has each of the quarters and how business is performing just suggests that you're not quite back to normal trading in the retail channel. I'm interested in whether you think the mix can get back to normal, or is the problem one of demand, where consumers have changed their attitudes? Or is it more around supply and the ability to supply the right products?
Yeah.
-to those customers? That's my first question. The second one is just on wages and, you know, there's a comment in the slide 11 that says you've got elevated position vacancies. I think you're still covered by an EBA, but I just noticed your wage growth was only 1% in the FY 2022 period. I'm interested in how you see wage cost containment in FY 2023.
Yeah. Craig, to deal with your first question, I mean, I think we're seeing a pretty good normalization of sales patterns across the channels getting much more back to what we would historically expect. A little bit of softness in retail, and probably as retailers put prices up, there will be some effect on demand, which will work its way through the system. I think we're confident over the course of this first half as we head into the back end of the year, things are gonna look much more like a normal trading pattern. Certainly that's what our customers are planning for. There's been some disruption to customer service levels, as you'd expect over the year. There's some of that still in the system. That does have an effect on.
By-products being out of stock obviously affects sales and demand. We've got a little bit of that to work through, but it continues to improve. Labor is clearly an issue. You know, it's well-publicized. There's certainly a shortage of labor, probably even more acute in New Zealand than it is in Australia. We have a whole variety of enterprise agreements. Some are in place, some are being negotiated. We have to work our way through that. There's likely to be some, you know, some pressure on labor costs throughout the year as we navigate those shortages.
Thank you. Our next audio question is from David Pobucky. David, please go ahead with your question.
Morning, Andrew and Gary. Look, thanks for taking my questions and the good color in the presentation. Just the first one is on feed costs of AUD 45 million in FY 2022, and that's expected to increase further in 2023. Just wanted to understand the potential quantum of the increase in 2023. You know, do you think it'll be greater than that AUD 45 million increase that you realized this year?
David, it's Gary. No, I can't give you the answer to that question. One, because of the feed costs. You can see the charts and you can see that there is a substantial increase that's flowing through for us into FY 2023. I can't be absolute on those.
Thanks, Gary. In terms of EBITDA margins on an underlying AASB basis, was 5% this year. Are you confident that you can get to, you know, an aspirational 9% margin at some point? Or do you think there's something, you know, structural in the industry or business, that would mean you can't get back to those sorts of levels?
Well, I think the margin we're looking at this year has clearly been affected by this sort of hopefully transient trading conditions. We certainly are planning that margin to expand over the course of this year. The expansion of margin over the long term certainly remains part of our objective as we look not only to lower costs and drive price where appropriate, but to improve the mix, the product mix as well, product and channel mix, which will help grow that margin. It will return to a better number during the course of this year, and it's our aspiration to keep expanding it over the future years.
Thanks, Andrew. Just one last one if I may, for Gary. In terms of interest expense in FY 2023 against the backdrop of rising rates, I mean, how much of your debt is based on kinda fixed and floating rates? Any color you could provide would be appreciated. Thank you.
We do have some cover. We do have a policy of fixing some of our interest rates, so we're protected to some extent, but also the levels of debt and the interest rate environment will lead it to go up a little bit.
Our next question comes from Rod Sleath. Rod, please go ahead with your question now.
Hi, Andrew and Gary. Thank you very much for taking my questions. I guess you guys are sort of living through the Chinese curse of living through interesting times regarding the last several months. I'd just like to. I've got a few questions, but I guess first, maybe I'll just ask them and then you can answer them. But the first one would be with regard to feed costs, pass through.
I know prior management and in the IPO documents, which I know is going back some time, the comments that were made then were that some 60% of then revenues, I think, rather than volumes, but perhaps volumes, but some 60% of revenues were contracted revenues that had a feed price feed-through clause within the contracts. I know that when the Woolworths contract was renewed, the press release at the time said that there was no significant change to the terms of the contract. I just wanna check that those large client relationships that have historically had feed cost pass-through clauses in them, that is still the case.
It is the case that there's an automatic pass-through of a substantial portion of that feed cost increase taking place. That was the first question. Secondly, is a question that I actually asked you on the last call, that is, you know, Baiada have significantly increased their capacity or potential capacity at the Hanwood facility, and presumably, as they've done that large CapEx upgrade, in theory, I'm presuming they would be expecting a cost advantage as well from that. I'm just wondering if you're seeing any evidence of any sort of structural change in the industry from the result of that extra potential capacity that they have, if that has played any part at all in what's happened over the last six months. Obviously, if it had, that might change expectations over what happens to pricing, et cetera, going forward.
Finally, just with regard to the ERP project, I'm just wondering if you could perhaps just update us on, now that you're a little further down the track, what your expectations are for time of implementation, and perhaps likewise, what you're expecting the total cost to be and perhaps what proportion of that you would think would be OpEx versus CapEx if you are at that stage. Can I just squeeze in one more, which is just a strategy question. On page 26, when you talk about transformed culture and capability, I mean, certainly you say that that chart is suggesting that you're doing that to implement the measures that sit above that.
If you were to look at the culture and capability of Inghams' historically versus where you want it to be, are you able to sort of summarize what's missing or what needs to change or what attitudes you think should be improved? Thank you.
There's a huge amount in all of that. There are pass-through mechanisms in some of our relationships, as we've noted in the past. Of course, in this current environment, feed is but one of the costs that we have to try and pass through. The negotiations with our customers not only focus on feed, but they're focusing on fuel and other supply chain costs and inputs. It's all part of the price negotiation. It all gets bundled up and we're doing it, and you know, we're having good success in passing those costs largely through at the moment. That's, you know, it's. I think that's going according to plan and will be helpful for this year's result.
On Baiada, look, the industry's been so disrupted over the last 12 months, it's very difficult to see. You know, just you gotta look through that. We haven't seen any particular structural change in behavior. Pretty much everyone's been scrambling just to keep the market supplied in the last 6-9 months. So as far as I can see and observe, the industry is behaving in a fairly orderly and rational fashion, and we would expect that to continue. On the cultural question, I mean, the number of issues, we obviously have got to continually watch our capability and looking at our strategy and what sort of capability we bring to the business. In particular, how we engage with our large customers who are quite sophisticated.
I guess historically, we haven't been probably as well equipped to deal with that level of sophistication, academy leadership than we would have liked. That's something that we've been addressing. Clearly, we've got an environment where you're looking for continuous improvement. We're trying to create a culture where people are comfortable and have the processes by which they can bring forward ideas for business improvement, business change, cost out, those sorts of things. A big part of the cultural landscape is creating a leadership environment that encourages that free flowing of information and a focus in the business that's all around continuous improvement. You know, what you might describe as an achievement culture, which is what we're really striving for.
That's a longer-term journey, and we have a variety of programs particularly focused on our frontline leaders and our senior leadership group to help enhance those sorts of cultural characteristics and behaviors. Might pass to Gary to talk about ERP.
Sure. We talk about a business transformation, process transformation, IT transformation. It's more than just an ERP, but that is certainly part of it. We're working through the design stage at this stage, so we haven't started implementation, and that's a decision that is to come. As to exactly what the scope will be and what the implementation will do, that's the work we're doing now to size that. Should we make the decision to go forward, it'll be a multi-year program. I won't be brave to be saying exactly the time period at this point in time. I suspect it'll be largely OpEx with the new accounting announcements that came through as to how you treat these projects.
We'll continue to treat it as we did this year outside of our underlying earnings. I think from a go-forward decision, we're probably in the range of that AUD 20 million-AUD 50 million mark, somewhere in that range. Hopefully that helps a little.
Thank you. Our next question is from Phillip Kimber. Phil, please go ahead.
Thank you. Just a question, obviously been a very unusual year, but there's a couple of unusual items that I found sort of buried away in the accounts. I just wanted some clarification on. It talked about in the SG&A line the SG&A was AUD 11.5 million lower because of not meeting the 2022 STIs, the release of an excess provision relating to the FY 2021 STI and also not meeting the FY 2020 LTI. I was just wondering that AUD 11.5 million, you know, as things get back to normal, should we assume that that sort of comes back into the P&L and sort of a broadly similar magnitude?
I guess the second question was also around tax, where I know you've highlighted there's a couple of issues that help keep the tax rate low. Where do you think the tax rate sort of will head back to, in hopefully a more normal year of FY 2023? Thanks.
Hi, Phil. With the SG&A, your estimation is right. I would say that they are temporary, and they will come back as you surmise. In regard to tax, the provision release of AUD 2.2 won't repeat. In relation to R&D credits, we do think that we'll have R&D opportunities going forward. The amounts will depend on the projects that we've done, but I would see an element of R&D continuing, an R&D benefit continuing into the future.
Here. Our next question is from Evan Karatzas. Evan, please go ahead with your question.
Thanks. Sorry. Just another one on price if I can. I'm referencing slide 10. Obviously you've mentioned price increase. Can I just ask, is that expected to be off the June 2022 sort of base of month base of almost AUD 540? Or is it more sort of across the average, the price average across FY 2022, expecting price increases to go off, if that makes sense?
Yeah. Well, clearly we've got price increases based on the average selling price of the previous year. You can see from that chart that, you know, we dip down very significantly in Q3, and we've got back to something that looks more like a normal run rate. With the price increases that we're planning, we'd expect that run rate to continue to increase during the year.
Our next question is from Belinda Moore. Belinda, please go ahead.
Gary. Hi, Andrew and Gary. Just noting your first half 2022 actual earnings were really quite resilient. Your outlook comments talked to sort of the first half of 2023 will have the headwind. Do I interpret that sort of first half 2023 earnings are therefore gonna be quite weak, but then in the second half of 2023, do you think you can sort of get back to a more, you know, normalized level of sort of EBITDA, if you can pass on all these costs? Secondly, can I just ask what sort of CapEx we should assume in 2023, please? Thank you.
Thanks, Belinda. It's Gary. CapEx in FY 2023, you can see that we have run a bit behind where we would like to be for the last couple of years, so we've been sort of in the low 60s for the last couple of years. If we can get the access to sites and supply chains, get the equipment that we've ordered here on time, then we'll be expecting to see an increase into FY 2023. You've probably seen if you go back through those periods, more in that 80-100 range. That would be as we sit here today. I think in regards to your summaries about earnings comments, I'd probably just say, without giving guidance and knowing that everything's uncertain, I can understand why we said that.
Our next caller is David Errington. David, please go ahead with your question.
Thanks. Morning, Andrew. Just a question, and I suppose it's following a bit on from Belinda's question, but a bit more longer term, if you like. When you talk about recovery, I'm sort of like trying to get my mind around recovery to what? And I suppose that's the thematic. You know, you're talking about just getting price increases to offset cost increases. I'm more looking at getting around these structural issue challenges that you've got in terms of absentees, and I've spoken to a lot of food producers. They just can't get workers. You're talking Qantas. You know, management have to go and act as baggage handlers. I've spoken to other food producers where management actually have to go on the production line. We're talking about bringing people in from overseas and putting them up in caravan parks. You know, structurally, it seems to have changed.
I don't know for how long, but that structural change where you can't get workers, transport, logistics, it's not just the cost to feed here that's challenging you, it's the actual ability to conduct your business. When do you think that you might be able to get on a level keel to be able to run a normal operation? You know, forget about price increases, offsetting cost increases. That's short-term stuff. I'm talking about getting back to being able to run your business in the manner to which you want to run it, to optimize efficiency. Because at the moment, what really disappoints me is it's the food producers that cop it in the neck. You know, your return is halved in one year from what, three or four bad months.
The retailers are okay, the food producers, or the feed producers or the raw material guys are doing okay. The processors with all the capital cop it in the neck. Until you can get your operations running at a normal level, that, then you're really up against it. When do you reckon your operations will be able to run at normal level, Andrew? Because talking to others, this could be two or three years away. Can you give a bit of a comment on that? Outside your control, completely outside your control, these are issues way outside, but it just worries me. We might be some time away before you can run a business at a level that you need to.
Yeah. David, you're absolutely right. There's clearly some real challenges when it comes to labor. Look, we're seeing things improving. We're getting more people back to work and more consistently back to work. That's getting better. I think one of our longer term challenges to deal with this structurally is how we set up the network, how we configure our manufacturing operations and particularly automation. There are some really good opportunities in that regard which will help us simplify production through plant specialization. They're gonna take a while to play out. One of the challenges at the moment, there is equipment we could buy that would significantly help ameliorate those issues.
We just can't get it, 'cause it's not, you know, it won't get into the country till, you know, probably next financial year. We've gotta really look at those, the whole way in which our network is set up, so it can navigate these sort of structural challenges. 'Cause you're absolutely right. You know, it's pricing and managing short-term costs is one thing, but the ongoing sustainability of the efficiency of the network and the viability of the network is clearly the bigger strategic issue. It's a huge question. Now, recent experience is a whole lot better than it was earlier in the year, and it's getting better.
I'm hopeful that over the course of this year, we'll be able to demonstrate a significant improvement in that regard. I agree with you, your point of view. There's a couple of years of significant structural challenges to navigate.
Thank you. Our next question is a written question from Richard Amland. It feels like the lag in commercial response to various cost pressures that should have been fairly visible was overly long. Why was this? Driven by contract structures with clients, competitive landscape or something else? Can this lag time be tightened up going forward because it feels like input costs will continue to show volatility?
I think you have to appreciate that when you're operating in the environment we were in the first half of this year, that the focus is primarily on getting product to market and getting product on shelves or through customers' supply chains. You know, that was the priority, and that was what our customers wanted us to spend time on, and that's what we spent time on. It's very difficult when you're in a crisis, a supply crisis, to be having those sorts of discussions. You've got to get some stability and some normality back in the system. We had to work our way through that. As soon as we did, we were quickly on to how do we, you know, manage these problems?
How do we pass some of those cost inputs through? We've acted as prudently and as urgently as we can, given the circumstances that we're under. You know, I think you just have to recognize it's not been a normal operating environment.
Thank you. Well, that is all the time we have for questions today. If you are in the questions queue or have submitted a question online, please reach out to Brett Ward for a response. All right. Thank you. That does conclude the broadcast.