I'm Rob McLeod, Chairman of Sanford Ltd. Thank you for joining us. We're delighted that we can meet both in person and for those of you that have not been able to be physically present by video. The Notice of Meeting and Fiscal 2024 Annual Report has been circulated and made available to all shareholders. You can all access these reports at any time via our website. As noted, today's meeting is being held as a hybrid meeting here at Eden Park and online via the Computershare Online Meeting platform. If you're online, congratulations. You've successfully negotiated a successful entry. Before we commence the formal business of the meeting, I should advise those present, in the event of an emergency, please remain calm and follow the clearly marked signs to exit the building safely. Please ensure that your mobile phones are on silent during the meeting.
I'm pleased to advise that, being a quorum of shareholders present, I declare the annual meeting open. To begin with, I'd like to take this opportunity to introduce you to those of my colleagues who are here with me today. On my immediate right is David Mair, our Managing Director. Alongside David is Paul Alston, Chief Financial Officer. Alongside Paul is Joanne Curran, an Independent Director. And alongside Joanne is Tom McClurg, an Independent Director. On my left is John Strowger, a Non-Executive Director. And alongside John is Craig Ellison, a Non-Executive Director. Also in attendance with us today are representatives from our auditors, KPMG, and our legal advisors, Chapman Tripp. Several of our leaders from Sanford are also here today, who David will introduce later. Now, in terms of the order of events, the order today will be as follows. First, I will provide my update on progress.
I will then hand over to David to give a brief presentation. I will provide an opportunity for questions at this point on both my address and David's presentation. I will then put the resolutions outlined in the Notice of Meeting to the meeting. We will cover each resolution in turn and invite questions specific to those resolutions. There will then be an opportunity for any discussion by shareholders on Sanford's business and performance. For online attendees, you may submit a question at any time. To do so, select the Q&A tab on the right half of your screen and type your question into the field and press Send. Please note that while you can submit questions from now on, I will not address them until the relevant time in the meeting.
Please note that your questions may be moderated or, if we receive multiple questions on one topic, amalgamated together. Finally, due to time constraints, we may run out of time to answer all questions, and if this happens, we will answer them in due course by email. Voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on all items of business. For those in attendance, you should all have a voting paper, which was given to you when you registered. If you don't, can you please indicate that situation now by raising your hand, and a member of the Computershare team will assist you. So I'll just pause for the raising of hands, if anybody. Okay, looks like we're all under control there. For those online, I now declare voting open on all items of business.
To vote, simply select your voting direction from the options shown on the screen. You can vote for all resolutions at once or by each resolution in turn. As you know, David Mair was appointed Managing Director on 1 May this year, a little under eight months ago. We were very pleased to report Sanford's highest ever normalized annual earnings result to 30 September this year. I'm very grateful to our wider stakeholders for enabling that result. The board has mandated David to review the group's operations and strategy, which is clearly a critical work in progress. David will therefore speak in more detail than me about Sanford's strategy and our operations at this meeting. At a macro level, the board remains focused on maximizing total shareholder return measured in share price and dividend performance over time.
I believe we can maximize total shareholder returns while also benefiting other Sanford stakeholders. These goals do not come as a trade-off, in my view. Sanford still requires a significant reform, but that change is aimed at making the company financially stronger and less risky. Sanford faces the standard challenges of an exporting and agricultural company with volatility in its catch and consumer demand and in its prices. Two of our biggest export markets are China and the United States, and both destinations are likely to impose more challenges on us in the near term. That said, we have choices about which pathways we take, which also reflects opportunity. I'd like to say a few words about our board. Four directors are standing at this ASM for re-election. They are Tom McClurg, Joanne Curran, Craig Ellison, and myself.
Because Tom and Jo were appointed by the board after last year's ASM, they must stand for re-election at this ASM. Craig and I have each served a prior three-year term, so we must also stand for re-election at this ASM. The board is presently comprised of six directors. Of these six directors, three are independent, namely Jo, Tom, and myself. John Strowger is not independent because of his relationship with a substantial product holder. David Mair is not independent because of being the Managing Director. Similarly, Craig Ellison is not independent because he was recently an interim Managing Director. Sanford's board must have at least two independent directors, which it does. Both the NZX Corporate Governance Code and Sanford's Charter recommend that most of the board be independent. Sanford does not meet this majority test at this time, with three in each category.
The NZX Code is a best practice recommendation and is not mandatory. The board is satisfied that the current position of three directors in each category of being independent or dependent is an acceptable balance between accommodating shareholder-nominated directors and the alternatives of appointing an additional independent director to achieve a four-three split within seven directors, or alternatively, removing a non-independent director to achieve a three-two split between five directors. Furthermore, if David were not the MD but were simply the CEO, the board notes that it would then have three of five independent directors and meet the requirement of a majority of independent directors. The board does not trivialize director independence, but we do because we also respect the role that is played by non-independent directors in the governance of public companies where those non-independent directors bring uniquely valuable attributes to the board.
Non-independent directors are commonplace in public company boards, and Sanford has had a long history of having them. The issue requires balance rather than prejudice. The legal and commercial role of the board is to represent the interests of all shareholders and not just a subset of them. My chairman's address in this year's annual report said that the mix of skills, cohesion, and teamwork are very positive around the board table. I believe our directors are business-savvy, sector-relevant, and shareholder-oriented. The new disclosure regime on climate is being phased in over time. Reporting against the latest climate reporting standards is required from the financial year beginning on or after 1 January 2023, which is 1 October 2023 for Sanford. In the second phase, the accounting periods ending on or after 27 October 2024, the disclosures relating to greenhouse gas emissions must be independently audited.
It will take time to develop the capability to produce high-quality climate-related disclosures. Some disclosure requirements may require an initial exemption. Therefore, not all requirements in the Aotearoa New Zealand Climate Standards are mandatory immediately. This regime will impose significant compliance obligations and costs on Sanford. I would like to thank our customers for their invaluable support over the last financial year. We can't obviously serve customers without people, so the board is also grateful to our hardworking teams of people in the company. Thank you to our shareholders for investing in the company and having confidence in the company. Last but not least, thank you to the senior leadership team and my fellow directors. All of your contributions are revealed in the bottom line result this past financial year.
A number of shareholders have asked me questions in the run-up to this ASM, some of which I have addressed in my remarks above. Many shareholders have commented favorably on the shortened annual report. This is a topic where some shareholders will have different views. The key reason why the leadership adopted the change was to communicate more simply, more directly, and more economically. Another shareholder has asked that we provide more details on the targeted skills of board members in future annual reports. There are also several questions about the MD's long-term incentive, or LTI, which is a share option scheme. The key clarifications sought here are that the options over the 1.8 million shares are the full amount granted in respect of the next three years. There will be no other annual grants during that period.
Further, the options can only be exercised in a brief window at the end of this three-year period. The formula for the exercise price is provided on page seven of the notice of meeting as A times B minus C. A is NZD 4, which is the starting hurdle price, and then that is adjusted each year by grossing it up for the weighted average traded price of shares at the time of the grant of the option. Sorry, I should just let me repeat that. The formula for the exercise price is provided at page seven, and it starts off at a price of NZD 4, which is the weighted average traded price for the shares at the time of the grant of the option.
That's grossed up by 1.259, which is the annual application of the company's weighted average cost of capital, which applied a 0.08 cost of capital and grosses it up, which effectively takes the NZD 4 to around NZD 5 in three years' time as the hurdle rate. So the shares have to be worth in excess of that before they become profitable to the MD. So, in other words, the application of a hurdle rate of share price growth before the options are in the money, and there's a final adjustment which subtracts from that price the dividends per share that are declared in each of the separate three years. So that ends my address as Chairman, and I would like now to hand over to David.
Thanks, Rob. Greetings. I'll begin by introducing some of my team. You've already been introduced to our CFO, Paul Alston. We have Vaughan Wilkinson. Please stand up. Sorry, Vaughan. He's in charge of sales and innovation and helps me with some of the strategic thinking. We have Debra Lumsden. She's the Chief People Officer and has done a great job of negotiating three collective agreements, concluding them favorably. Stuart Hurlestone is GM of Finance and will be our moderator. Let's see what's over here. He'll be our moderator for online questions. Roberto Magaraggia is the Legal Counsel. He did a very good job, together with Paul Alston, of going to London to ensure that we had a much better deal on insurance costs. Thanks, guys. We need every dollar we can get. Emma Croft, you'll have a chance later. There's a stand over there showing some of the innovative products.
She works with Vaughan on innovation, marketing, and innovation. Sorry, she's the group marketing manager. We have Danae Smith, who is right at the back. So she's our executive EA, and yes, she's the boss. Emma and Danae will have microphones when it's time for questions. I've been Managing Director of Sanford from the 1st of May 2024. Since taking over, I've spent most of my time reviewing the existing strategy and plans and focused hard on capital allocation and cash flow. I'll talk about that more later. Just a quick update on FY24. Revenue, I mean, this is old news now in some ways. Revenue increased about 5%, mainly due to consistent pricing and solid volumes across the business. I've been very focused on reducing spend on IT, cash donations, subscriptions, and consultants. I obviously need a lot of help, and my wife would agree.
I've been overwhelmed by the offers of help from various consultants. I've thanked them. Some of the growth in revenue dropped straight through to EBIT, but combined with the other areas of improvement, these were the main reasons that we had a record-adjusted EBIT result of NZD 74.2 million. Previously, there was a strategy to move up the chain and closer to the customer. It was called Sea to Me. As you move closer to the customer, a number of things can happen. You may get a better price, but there are additional costs and risks. You must know that you are making more money before you make those channel changes, and they're very hard to undo once you've made them. One change of direction has been to move back to re-establishing our relationships with major wholesalers in key markets.
This has been effective, particularly in both the U.S. and China markets. Part of the effect of this implementation of channels is highlighted in the graph on gross margin. Obviously, pricing is held up as well. We had impact of NZD 19.7 million. It was an improvement on the PCP, the corresponding period. So why such a relatively poor result given the EBIT improvement? First of all, there's a sort of an outlier there you can see, which was the one-off sale of crayfish quota that positively impacted FY 2022. In FY 2024, we had a round of significant asset impairments, so including North Island Mussels Limited, we refer to it as NIML, the Auckland site, and a lot of assets related to the bioactives plant in Blenheim. In the first half of 2024, we had an operating cash flow of NZD 8.3 million.
To finish the year with NZD 73 million is a fantastic result. From May, with board support, we focused on turning inventory into cash. The sales team, Vaughan and his team, in particular, have done an excellent job of selling through that inventory and collecting our cash. So a big change there was really inventory sale through and collecting our money. There's a useful expression that I use a lot. You only sell inventory once. Obviously, that performance is unlikely to be repeated in FY25. A lot of that is sort of one-off in that sense, but it is still an area of focus. I've been concerned at the level of debt and the associated interest costs, and that's outlined in the presentations for the full year. In FY25, we expect our interest costs to go up about NZD 2 million, even as interest rates appear to be coming down.
This is because our favorable interest cover is rolling off. We must work harder to stand still. My view is our total debt is too high, but it's not just the quantum of debt. It's the ability to move quickly as growth opportunities become available, usually at short notice. I'll talk about capital allocation or my way of thinking about this because this is fundamental to any business leader. First of all, capital people assume it's dollars, but I see capital as people and dollars. We want to get the best people working on the most important projects, and those projects are one part of realizing any strategy. So these are the points I think about every time I'm considering capital allocation. We should fund strategies, not isolated projects. In other words, it's not about buying another boat, for example. We should have zero tolerance for bad growth.
We should assume a zero-based allocation, capital allocation each year. We want to have the view in the company that there is ample capital available, but it is expensive. In other words, we don't want to hold back thinking about how to grow profitably. There should be no capital rationing, but the critical thing is for us to know the value of the assets. Of course, we need to agree strategy, but also we need to hold people accountable to the investment case. I think it is fair to say that this has not been done well in the past. We need a disciplined approach. I have changed our capital review process. All capital comes to the CFO, Paul, and me for review. We have been investing heavily. Sanford has been investing heavily in assets over the last few years, and we need to align our spend with our strategies.
Slightly different is cash allocation from capital allocation, but it's the same kind of thinking. So this is a simple diagram, and we've been using this to think hard about the cash flows. Obviously, on the left-hand side, you have operating cash flow. In FY24, that was NZD 73 million I mentioned earlier. Going forward, we believe we can properly maintain assets for less than the NZD 46 million we spent in FY24. This has been a concern from a number of shareholders. Three scampi boats for whatever, for example. There is then a trade-off between debt repayments and dividends. That top part is organic growth. We need to be prepared. The bottom part is finance for strategic investment and those kind of opportunities. They will come up. So if we have a strategic investment opportunity, we either need to get finance from somewhere, increase our debt, or reduce dividends.
It's kind of mathematical, I guess. For me, debt reduction is a priority. Sanford doesn't give guidance, but just my thinking about the future. Economic value, such as sustained high profitability and a healthy financial standing, is the most important foundation for any business. Without securing economic value, we cannot take on other challenges. If we don't recognize this fact and consider the other contributors to corporate value from the same perspective, our existence as a company will be diminished. In creating corporate value, we must not forget it is you, the shareholders, that evaluate our efforts. I started this address reflecting on what was achieved in FY24, what we learned through that period, and what needs to be achieved going forward. This business is in turnaround mode, and so we are reviewing all aspects of the business bottom up.
We must review every process and commit to continuous improvement to mitigate any further cost increases. The objective is to simplify and optimize standardized business processes and tools, enabling access to more insightful information, a more secure environment, and ultimately better outcomes for our customers and our people. Sanford has a significant tangible and intangible asset base measured using a mixture of book and fair value. As part of the strategic review of each part of the business, rigor will be applied to determining if sufficient value is being achieved from these assets. This review will encompass both the short and medium-term use and profitability attained from those assets. A particular focus will be on our, in some cases, aged assets and whether the required maintenance and upkeep is commensurate with attainable and incremental profit achievement. Additionally, we own fishing quota and licensed water space that needs to be reviewed.
Sustainability. Addressing climate change continues to be a critical issue for all businesses. As identified in the chair's address, high emphasis is being placed on understanding future climate impacts on Sanford's business. We are investing resources into completing the complex work of different climate scenarios to understand the potential impacts on our physical assets and manage transition risks, which will vary from one jurisdiction to another. This work will, in turn, inform future investment decisions and help with mandatory reporting obligations in FY25 and beyond. The Sustainability Report is now a separate document and will be available before 31st of January 2025. Finally, I'd like to thank the senior leadership team. Several of those people are here and all staff for their contributions during FY24, and finally, I appreciate the support of both the directors and shareholders. Thank you.
Thank you, David. Before we move to consider the resolutions that are before the meeting, we will now open the floor to both people in the room and online participants to put questions following the presentations from David and myself. A reminder to please state your name and whether you are a shareholder or proxy holder. I will take questions from the floor first. Thank you.
Liz Slooten, shareholder. I'm sure you're aware that fishermen off the East Coast, South Island have reported 12 hectares of dolphins caught in trawl nets and a few more in gill nets. And I'm just wondering to what extent Sanford is exposed to that. So, for example, are any of those fishermen fishing against Sanford quota, or are they selling their fish to Sanford, and Sanford is either selling it on or exporting it on?
Thank you. David, if you...
Yeah, I'm able to. I can answer that. But one of you have you got any idea? I've got no idea, sorry. You'll have to use the microphone.
Hopefully, that can be addressed in the Sustainability Report when it comes out in January.
Okay. Thank you. Next question.
[McLaren], shareholder, an article in the New Zealand Herald several weeks ago, it mentioned that Sanford had sold property on the waterfront, namely the fish market, and they had sold it to a well-known developer who, in turn, stated that they were going to build luxury apartments on it. Now, there's no mention in the annual report or even your earlier remarks of this afternoon about such a situation. What I'm asking is, what is the situation regarding the sale of land by Sanford?
Right. David, I'll invite you, sir.
Yeah, thank you. No deal is complete. So there's been some consideration of what to do with the site. Some of the comments were around the auction. So remember, on the site, we have the auction. We also had some old processing, and we have the head office itself, if that makes sense, and there are some associated leases for some of the food service or whatever. So, of course, we will announce when any deal is done. No deal is finalized at this stage.
Coralie Van Camp, shareholder. I haven't really gained much insight into the running of the business from either of your addresses. It's all very theoretical and very much in accounting mode. Last year, I raised the matter of the Sydney Fish Market Expansion, and I Googled it recently. It is amazing. The New South Wales Government are involved in it. Shane Jones, with his regional development fund and your proximity to the water, you've almost got an identical geographical situation to expand your market there into something similar, perhaps on a smaller scale. But apartments, for God's sake, they're all over Auckland, and some of them are shocking.
Surely, there has to be something better to do with that site to expand your business and make a wonderful tourist destination out of your property, not, and are we only going to find out after you've done it, and in that case, could I please ask all the directors who have been in favor of doing it before I vote for them?
Thank you. Perhaps just a few words before David speaks. Essentially, these transactions of this nature are commercially sensitive. They can't be conducted in the gaze of the open public. As the Chief Executive has said, the matter is in negotiation and in discussion. Those are commercially sensitive discussions. They can't be openly shared with the New Zealand public, let alone with New Zealand shareholders. Ultimately, that is before us. In terms of the impact on Sanford, remember that this is an inshore aspect of our business. We have recently concluded, as you will know, the leasing of our inshore quota to Moana. So essentially, that demonstrates a shift in strategy to a landlord relationship to the inshore business. So for much of the inshore business, we are a landlord, effectively leasing quota as opposed to actually catching, let alone selling the catch.
So that's in the background. And also, you need to stand back and look at the company's total operation. It's an exporting company. Most of its revenues are generated offshore, not onshore. And essentially, you've got to stand back and look at the significance of these assets in terms of not only their capacity to generate revenue in the future, but obviously in the past. So I think just putting it in perspective is important. So David, would you like to perhaps.
Could I just add to that?
Y es.
You have got a wonderful site. There is a provision there where a ferry could come up to the edge of the water, just like in Sydney, and people could disembark from it and come into a marvelous eatery area where if you're shrinking your business of actually fishing, you're shrinking your business, and you're just ending up on selling something from someone else. That's not an expansion of the business. I just can't see where your direction is going to be good in the long term. If you do sell that building, it's all commercially sensitive, and then we find out afterwards. I'm talking about whether you sell it or not, not what your commercial sensitivities are around it. It's a matter of do you sell it or not, or do you use the site for expansion in a wonderful, iconic tourist destination.
Yeah. Thank you for the question. I outlined capital allocation. We don't own the site. We lease the site. Now that the inshore business has moved to Moana, we don't make a lot of money off the site. The building has run down. So we're not property owners, developers in that sense. And so the future of the Wellington waterfront is really it's an issue for property developers and others. Whether they turn it into apartments or anything, we can all have an opinion around that. My focus is to make sure we invest our capital, Sanford's capital, in what we're good at, which is fishing. A lot of what we do, agriculture, we're not talking about that, but that's in Havelock. That's down south. We need to grow our South Island presence.
We've got a huge building that we don't really use. There used to be a fishing factory there that's no longer used. Auctions tend to be online. So the relative value of the site compared to what we could do to grow our business profitably is the discussions we're having. People may disagree about that, but to me, it's about allocation of capital. Thank you.
Okay. Are there any further questions from the floor over here?
Douglas Lau from Forte Funds, shareholder. Dave, can you just outline you've been reviewing this strategy? Can you just give an update on that and how it's changed from the one presented two years ago?
It's a strategy. Yes. Sorry.
Thank you. I think when I look at the business and there's a view that commodity businesses are bad, a lot of what we do is produce products that actually go into commodity markets, and there's a way of structuring that, so we're working through this now. I don't have a formal update of our strategy, but previously, we've spent a lot of money changing channels and trying to add value and adding, in my view, even greater cost. You have to be very careful with that, so I did mention in my address about the consolidation back to mainly wholesalers and markets who are far better taking on the risk of distribution within markets, for example, China and the U.S.
So what I'm working with Vaughan on is we are focused on a basket of products from the front end and making sure we have very good products and service, and the back end must be driven on productivity to mitigate the inevitable cost increases. So that's kind of the strategy. It's not divisions like salmon, mussels. It's not as simple as that. It's about front end, basket of products, back end, drive cost out. That's a simple view of our strategy. Thank you.
Yes, another question here.
Rob O'Connor, representing the New Zealand Shareholders Association and also a shareholder. Thank you for your comments, Rob, on the cohesion with the directors for the board. I've noticed that we don't have the matrix, which you've already talked about. It makes it really hard for us to understand how committed the board is and what the skill mix is and whether we're likely to see more turnover in the future, or is it stable?
Yes, well, thank you for the question. The future is uncertain, so nobody can predict it with perfection in the absence of a crystal ball. But certainly, from the experience that we as a board are having today, I believe that our board is stable. We have had no unplanned departures from the ASM of last year. And as we've moved from that time, for those of you that were at the meeting last year, you'll recall that this subject received quite a lot of attention and discussion. And I think the direction of travel that we set from that time to now has strengthened the company in terms of its board, cohesion, and direction. That also partly explains why a degree of evolution is necessary.
To go from a small number to a large number of new directors is not necessarily the safest way of going, although at six, we are arguably one more than that we have been in the past. Sanford has had a board of five directors in the past. We've got six currently, but we're in the model of having a managing director rather than a non-managing director, CEO. So yes, but just to answer your question directly, I am very confident that our board is working together as a team, is a very effective team, and is committed to the company. And I think that a lot of the challenges that we've had in the last 12 months are behind us, well behind us. Thank you. Are there any other questions from the board? Sorry, from the floor over here?
One last question, So Rob. How is the fish lab doing in Blenheim, where you've been for some time looking at the byproducts from fish? How successful has the work been in that laboratory?
Right. So I'll ask our Chief Executive to answer. Thank you.
The initial proposal was related to developing some byproducts from hoki and things like that. That is not working. So there was an attempt to break into the collagen market and things like that. It's essentially now a facility to turn mussels into mussel powder and mussel oil. It's being reviewed. So I guess we have one key customer, Lintbells, in the U. K. They're a top pet food supplier. We need to know, one, we can supply at the quality they require, and we need to know that we can make money. So it is under review now.
How long has it been making money up to this point in time?
It hasn't made money.
Thank you.
There's a question down here.
Yeah. Lyle Paice is my name. I'm a shareholder. I have a couple of questions. I understand that 80% of the United States market is imported fish. I'm sure a lot of it comes from Canada. However, it's a huge importing market. Now, the question is, with President-elect Donald Trump imposing a lot or apparently going to impose a lot of tariffs, I understand he's chasing the seafood market. Do you guys have any feel for what's going to happen there? And if it's negative, how damaging will it be?
Well, I'll ask David to respond, but perhaps just by way of introduction, I think that all exporting companies in New Zealand have had this subject on the lips. And I think there are some general principles that are emerging in the discussion. For one thing, it's unclear in specific detail. These were campaign-motivated remarks, but to be fair, President-elect Trump has been consistently a fan of tariffs. The second point really is, where do the tariffs? Who's going to bear the tariff? The tariff is imposed by the United States on the exporting company, but obviously, a price adjustment on the underlying trade can shift the burden of that tariff to other parties and, in particular, the customer.
And indeed, many people do argue in today's markets that tariffs are a bad idea for an importing nation because they raise the price of goods to internal consumers, to American consumers. To assume that prices will remain the same with the tariff being extracted from the exporter is arguably naive, that that will not be inflationary to price. So I think that gives us some scope for at least recognizing that not the full burden will necessarily reach Sanford, but there's also the primary and fundamental issue of whether our product range is going to be particularly targeted by the way in which the U.S. roll out any such policy. But David, no doubt you can add to that.
No, actually, that covered it. Sorry. We really have to have those discussions with the wholesalers that we deal with. It comes down to who pays the tariff, and I have no idea the level of the tariff. We have to be ready to move quickly on that. And we've had internal discussions about how to deal with that. But as Rob said, we're in the same position as a lot of exporters. The one good thing, a lot of our products are well-liked in a number of markets. This is why it's important to think about key markets.
Just one other question, a similar topic perhaps. You deal through wholesalers now, as opposed, as I understand, in the past, Sanford was selling directly more or less to restaurants and users, for want of a better word. So if you're selling to wholesalers, my question is, is Sanford a price taker or a price setter? And if it's a price setter, what percentage of your products approximately are you able to set the price on?
Okay. Well, again, just by way of introduction, I think it would be fair to say that Sanford's been in both modes. It's always had commodity offerings. And in a sense, my view is that the price dynamic and price negotiation is a product-by-product, country-by-country, buyer-by-seller dynamic. So there's enough in that to create a degree of diversity rather than to be able to answer with a stock answer that applies to every situation in the company. But David, have you got anything to say further to that? Maybe that Vaughan may be the better person to respond.
Yes. I'm sure Vaughan will correct me if I get this wrong. But anyway, look, from my point of view coming in, I think of a lot of Sanford's products as commodities, and we are price takers. That's just the bottom line. Having said that, take our salmon, which is a kind of king salmon. It's about 2% of the world salmon market. So Atlantic salmon's the biggest part. But if you think about that, within that, even New Zealand exporters, we know where our price is relative to other salmon exporters. So again, Vaughan and his team, they do a very good job of testing price. There's no such thing as the right price. You have to keep testing it again and again.
But we're not in a position where we can say ours is branded this way, therefore people and remember, who decides premium? The customer. It's not us. So we can put whatever fancy packaging we want on it. The customers decide that. So for many of our products, the fundamental driver is an increasing demand for high-quality protein. That's a big part of what we do. Thank you.
Thank you. Are there any further questions from the floor? Yes, Coralie.
Sorry to be a pain, but if your property is on leasehold land, which is obviously in perpetuity, it's really only the lease to the land and the old building that you'd be able to sell to a developer. So you obviously have the rights to the lease for as long as you want it. If you had some of your major shareholders like Ngāi Tahu and some of your wealthy family shareholders, you could actually do something, couldn't you, to have like the Sydney Fish Market there? It doesn't have to be apartments. You could actually do a development there with partners, couldn't you? Yourself.
That's theoretically a possibility. But of course, we're not a property company. We're not a property development company. So essentially, we wouldn't profess to be specialists in that asset.
No, but you've been in the business of selling fish to the public directly and having an eatery around the back, the Marvellous Fish and Chip Shop with the paper plates around the back. I mean, you have been in that business. All you would be doing is expanding it.
Yes. Well, we've been in that business by having operators come in and operate those businesses. We haven't operated those businesses in that area directly as Sanford. So again, we've been a landlord, a bit like the Moana relationship. We've been a landlord by collecting leases or rents off people who operate businesses, obviously affiliated to seafood, which is relevant. But again, I remind you that we have not concluded anything in this space. So these are opportunities that are before us, and opportunities are valuable. Options are valuable. Better than not having them.
So would you be conducive to talking to Shane Jones about the regional fund?
Oh, absolutely. I mean, essentially, Shane Jones is the Minister of Fisheries also. He's somebody that we do speak with from time to time. So we have a relationship with him.
I'm in the Fish Market and I consider you well. I don't think we've got necessarily enough people to create the possibility.
I'm sorry. I can't hear what you're saying.
If I may, we have some large important shareholders that are specialist property people, and it would be easy for them maybe to develop the site or whatever. So here's the simple thing. What I hear from shareholders is they want share price appreciation. Well, that's someone else's measure of how well we run the business and dividends. That is poor use of our cash. The bottom line is the fish market does not make a lot of money. It certainly doesn't give us the return that we should expect for the value.
In the form it's been, no, but maybe in the future.
No. We have to borrow money from someone, pay interest, and then speculatively get into we're not a property; we're a fishing company.
Okay.
Thank you.
Are there any other questions from the floor? No. Oh, yes, there's one here. Oh, sorry.
Yeah. My name is Hailey Cheng, shareholder for quite a long time. I wish to inquire, you just mentioned the biggest market is USA and China. For USA, do you export to the East Coast like New York? Do you, David?
Yeah.
You do. Yeah. And salmon, is that correct?
Yes.
What else?
Other fish. I don't understand the point.
What about mussels?
Yes, we do.
Yes. Answer is yes.
But I think you can improve your business because I have read the magazine, the Forbes magazine, and it mentioned that restaurants selling those horrible mussels, not from New Zealand, but from maybe Canada, that sort of thing, the very small one, tasteless one. So we can export more because New York, they have a lot of billionaires. Yeah, they don't mind the money to spend money. If you waste money, you target the market to expand your business there. And also, another one, if you wish to earn.
Do you have a question? The session is for questions.
Yeah.
Okay.
Another one.
I gave you some free advice, but do you have a question?
And another one is, what about the Chinese market? Because now Sanford, I think it will stop doing the fishing, etc., during the Christmas and New Year holiday. But I wish that you pay attention to the Chinese economy because they will have stimulus to their economy before the Chinese New Year. And this year, the Chinese New Year is about the end of January to early February. So if you would like to expand that market, keep it real because this year.
Okay. Thank you very much. That's good advice. And of course, China has been stimulating, and we will take note of that. We export a lot of product to China.
This year, there will be stimulus in order to save their economy.
Thank you.
Yeah. Keep it real. Thank you.
Thank you for your advice. Is there any other question from the floor?
No. Stuart, how are we going on the online questions?
Chair, there are no specific questions in relation to your and the Managing Director's address.
Thank you, Stuart. There appears to be no further questions or matters for discussion, so we will come to the formal business of the meeting. Following this section, there will also be an opportunity to ask questions of me and David and other directors and executives in attendance about the business performance. Am I in the right place here? Yes, we are. So we have six resolutions to be voted on today. The first two relating to the election of Tom McClurg and Joanne Curran as directors, and the third and fourth relating to the re-election of Craig Ellison and myself as directors. The fifth being the auditor's fee. The sixth and final for the issue of options to David Mair. I shall give an opportunity for discussion on each resolution, and we will also monitor the online platform for questions.
At the appropriate time, should you wish to raise a comment or question, please raise your hand, and we will bring a microphone to you or you can submit your question on the online platform. By way of introduction, please advise your name, whether you are a shareholder or if a proxy holder, the name of the shareholder represented. As noted earlier, in accordance with the NZX listing rules, voting will be by poll. Those here at Eden Park should all by now have a voting paper which was given to you when you registered. As noted before, online attendees can vote at any time. Several shareholders have cast a postal vote or have appointed proxies to cast their vote ahead of today's meeting. I advise that the board is holding discretionary proxies which will be voted in favour of all resolutions.
So resolution number one is the election of Tom McClurg. In accordance with the company's constitution. Tom McClurg retires at this meeting and, being eligible, offers himself for election, t he board recommends Tom to you as a director of Sanford and unanimously supports his election. Before we consider the resolution, I would like to invite Tom to briefly talk in support of his election.
Chairman Rob. Tēnā koutou katoa, good afternoon. My name is Tom McClurg. I was appointed to the board of Sanford in February 2024 as an independent director. You can expect of me that I take the responsibilities of an independent director seriously, and I'll be guided at all times by what I consider to be in the best interest of all Sanford shareholders. It's not only a responsibility. It's perhaps a personal predisposition as well. What I bring to the board is 30 years or more experience in various roles within the New Zealand seafood sector, with particular emphasis on fisheries management and conservation. That's built on a basis of background training in economics and science, with a light dusting of corporate finance and valuation.
It's a privilege to be a director of Sanford. It's a company that's a leader in an important sector that has a proud history. But more than that, I think it also has a very bright future and one in which I think there is plenty of benefit available to the owners or the shareholders in the company to be obtained in years to come. Thank you.
I now move, as an ordinary resolution, that Tom McClurg be elected as a director of the company. I'll pause for any questions on this resolution. We'll take questions from the floor first. Are there any questions? No. Stuart, any questions on? Yes, one over here.
John Hume, Shareholder. What other directorships does he have, Tom?
I'm the chairman of Fishserve, which is the industry-owned entity that maintains all of the registers underpinning the Quota Management System. I'm a director of Port Nicholson Fisheries, which is a lobster exporting business with export plants in Wellington and Auckland, currently exporting around about 1,000 tons of lobsters. And I have other directorships in primary sector companies. Sanford is the only publicly listed company that I am a director of.
Thank you. Are there any other questions from the floor? Right. Okay. Stuart, any online?
Yes, Chair. Mr. Paul Grant has asked Tom why do you believe Sanford has a bright future.
Sanford produces some excellent products, has a great set of customers, a wonderful asset base in terms of its aquaculture and wild fishing rights, and I think these are products which anyone would want to be involved in.
Thank you, Stuart. Any other questions? Okay. Thank you. So we'll now come to the election of Jo Curran. And in accordance with the company's constitution, Jo Curran retires at this meeting and being eligible offers herself for election. The board recommends Jo to you as a director of Sanford and unanimously supports her election. Before we consider the resolution, I would like to invite Jo to briefly talk in support of her election.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good afternoon, everyone. As a new director, I am truly delighted to be here today. I'm very much looking forward to working with my fellow directors to support David and his management team to make Sanford a better business. Someone over here asked about skills matrices, and they are very important. You can see from my bio that I bring to the board deep financial, analytical, and strategic skills gained over more than 25 years as a CFO of some very large multinational complex companies. Throughout my career, I have been passionate about improving the performance of businesses that I've been involved with.
Alongside my day job of adding up the numbers, I have led a number of transformational projects which delivered increases in profits, cash flow, and shareholder value, either through top-line growth, operational efficiency, or tighter capital allocation, as well as divesting non-core or underperforming businesses. I do acknowledge that I have much to learn about the seafood industry, but I am a good listener, have an appetite for learning, and an inquiring mind. I have worked successfully across a very vast range of industries and have consistently demonstrated throughout my career that I can quickly get up to speed with the dynamics of a business and identify opportunities to add value. More specifically, as an NED, I bring 15 years of governance experience as audit chair on four global large-scale businesses, two of those listed and two private businesses about the same size as Sanford.
Over that time, I've strived to ensure integrity in decision-making processes, accountability from management, and I have a real reputation as a non-exec director, and that reputation is for always asking the right questions, and I think that has added value in all those companies that I've been involved with. I will truly do my very best for Sanford, and I am very excited to be able to join the team and work with the guys. Thank you.
I now move, as an ordinary resolution, that Joanne Curran be elected as a director of the company. I will now pause for any questions on this resolution. And again, we'll take questions from the floor first. There's a question down here.
Jo, can you tell me those ASX 50 companies that you have been the director?
I was finance director at P&O Australia.
Can you speak louder?
First of all, P&O Australia, but then I was promoted to the main board in the U.K., so the global group P&O of Lendlease in Australia. I've been non-exec director of Atkins, which is a huge global engineering group, and also of Dialog Semiconductor, which is one of the largest chip manufacturers in the world.
Then, are you a resident of New Zealand or Australia?
I am a New Zealander. I was born here, and I lived here until I was about 23 years old, and then I went to the U.K. I've spent the predominant part of my life in the U.K., but in global businesses, so take P&O, for example. We had businesses in China, India, Australia, New Zealand, America. So throughout my career, I've always had exposure to many regions and obviously to Australia and New Zealand as well. So although I've lived offshore, I've remained knowledgeable about the economies and the drivers of business in many different countries.
Then, may I ask that for your tax resident, which country are you a tax resident?
Tax resident. I'm tax resident now in New Zealand because I came back to live here two years ago. Prior to that, I was tax resident in the U.K.
Yeah. Then I wish that you improve some business in the U.K. Then what about Australia? Can you improve the business there? Because I noticed the Australian business, the revenue dropped quite a lot. Yeah. Because I think they have a beautiful fish market. And even three weeks ago, I was in Sydney, and the television advertised that saying that the longest living resident in Australia is now 115 years old. And what is his secret? His secret is to eat fish and chips every Friday. So let's go to eat fish and chips every Friday. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Thanks again for your advice. That makes the questions. Okay. So Stuart, are there any online questions?
We have a question from Mr. Paul Grant. Jo, please, could you expand on the risks of Sanford as a company?
On the risks of Sanford? I mean, I've only been on board for two months, so I haven't reflected on the risks significantly. But I guess it's to continue to diversify the markets and customers, so not to be dependent on one market and one customer. And then it's around being able to continue to grow the products, the various products. People are clearly a risk in any organization, a very important part of any organization. But to be fair, I haven't yet been through the risk register and understood all the risks that are identified. It's very early days for me, but it's something that will be an important part of my role going forward.
Thank you, Jo. Stuart, any others?
Chair, there are no further questions on this resolution.
Thank you, Stuart. So thanks, Jo. So we will now come to the re-election of Craig Ellison. In accordance with the company's constitution, Craig Ellison retires at this meeting and being eligible offers himself for re-election. The board recommends Craig to you as a director of Sanford and unanimously supports his election. Before we consider this resolution, I would like to invite Craig to briefly talk in support of his election. Craig.
Thank you. I'm going to join.
Thanks, Rob. Tēnā koutou katoa. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and good afternoon, shareholders. This is my third ASM of Sanford, noting the first was online due to COVID. But I have had the opportunity to meet and engage with many of you in this room. And therefore, many of you know me and what I bring to Sanford. Those qualities are a lifelong industry experience in the seafood sector, deep understanding of the seafood markets, extensive governance experience, and a real passion for the seafood sector to do well. Thank you to those who have supported my re-election, and I look forward to further engagement both today and in the future, and also look forward to the ability to contribute strongly to Sanford's growth and performance. Kia ora koutou katoa.
I now move an ordinary resolution that Craig Ellison be elected as a director of the company. And I will also pause for questions on the resolution, first from the floor. Are there any questions? There's a question here.
Thank you. Question for Craig, but some of the other board members may be interested to comment as well. It's on the leasing of quota to Moana Fishing. As I understand it, that's for 10 years. Is that correct? And what does the board think? How appropriate do they think this is? Is this a good deal for Sanford? What are the risks and potential benefits?
Well, we're in a situation where we're looking at a particular director's nomination. So you've got a general question there, but I will allow that to be answered. Okay. All right. Craig. Craig was obviously heavily involved in that transaction as the acting CEO at the time.
Yeah, thanks. Liz, I think it's a good deal for Sanford. It's a very good deal for Moana. They bring a specialized inshore focus that over time Sanford have perhaps lost. I think it's a scale game for Moana, and it's a scale game for us as well. We can focus on where we're excellent or going to be excellent. So you marry the two options that are in front of us, and ultimately, I think it's a good deal for us, but it also brings us together because both of us must perform against that deal. And there will be challenges, no doubt, but it is a very good deal for Sanford. I think I'll just perhaps add to that that I'm very confident that the full board was enthusiastic about the transaction and fully support it.
So are there any other questions from the floor? No. So Stuart, any online?
There's one again from Mr. Paul. [audio distortion] What do you think is the impact on the wildcatch business if a war breaks out? [audio distortion]
Thanks, shareholders, for the intriguing questions I'm being asked. Let's focus on what we do well. We catch and supply superb seafood to the world. And while I mean, we already have a number of wars actually occurring as we exist today in Europe and the Middle East, we need to focus on what we can do. We need to have an understanding of the impacts that they may or may not have on us, whether that is reflected in the price of our fuel and the operations that we carry out through our vessels or through market access. There are things that a company of the size and scale of Sanford must have an engagement with and a view upon and look to react as best and as quickly as we can.
Thank you, Craig. Any further questions? No.
No.
Okay. So I now come to the re-election of myself. In accordance with the company's constitution, I retire at this meeting and offer myself a re-election. But before I hand over to John Strowger, I will just say a few words in support of my nomination. So I was appointed to the board on the 1st of January 2016, which puts me on the company board for around nine years. So I'm the longest-standing director, and I'd like to submit that that's a strength in terms of my candidacy. The board composition currently is comprised of a number of new directors, and I think that the time that I've had with the company has given me good insight and experience into it. My skills are in governance and business and management and finance.
I've been a director of many public companies in New Zealand, such as Telecom, SkyCity Entertainment Group, and currently, for example, I'm also a director of the Port of Tauranga. I've had an extensive career as a director of private companies, so not only widely held but also closely held, run largely by owner-operator or owner-operator families. In terms of the fishing sector, I've had reasonably extensive experience not only in Sanford across this last nine-year period, but I've also been a prior chairman of Sealord. I'm a prior chairman of Aotearoa Fisheries Limited in Moana, which is now known as Moana. I was a Waitangi Fisheries Commissioner, which essentially had as its business the marine quota system in this country. I was also chairman of Raukura Moana Limited, which is the Tainui-owned and operated fishing company in conjunction with the other members of the Tainui Waka.
I'm currently the chairman of the commercial arm of Ngāti Porou, which is New Zealand's second-largest iwi, and it owns two fisheries subsidiaries. So throughout that period, I've had a lot of ongoing experience in the sector. It's probably fair to say, particularly in the Māori part of that sector. And I believe also that that makes me unique in terms of just being a member of the board that can assist with, hopefully, the relationships that we need with a major player in the sector being iwi and Māori. I spent most of my career as a chief executive of accounting firms, and the last five years at the tail end of my career as the chief executive of Ernst & Young for Oceania, which includes Australia, New Zealand, and the islands plus Indonesia at the start, where I was based in Sydney.
So, I have skills both technical, general, and business-wise. I'm keen to remain in Sanford for a little while longer. I'd like to be associated with stronger financial performance of the company, and I think my vote for remaining signals my confidence that this company can improve its performance, particularly relative to its performance over the last two or three years, and I would look forward to participating in the turnaround that is currently underway of the company to achieve that in the medium term. Thank you very much, so I'll pass across to John.
Good afternoon. Now everyone gets to speak. The board recommends Rob McLeod as a director of Sanford and unanimously supports his re-election. I now move as an ordinary resolution that Rob McLeod be re-elected as a director of the company. I'll now move as sorry. I'll now pause for any questions on this resolution and take questions from the floor first. Are there any questions? Douglas. John.
Rob, the company's had quite a few strategic pivots over the years, and none of them sort of quite sort of improve shareholder returns or meet those initial strategic assumptions. I'm just wondering if you've got any lessons you've learned from that, and how do we sort of learn from those lessons and plan for going forward?
Yes. I think many of the lessons that are important to Sanford, I think, are uncomplicated in the sense that essentially it's all about leadership, and that leadership has got to manifest itself both at the executive and at the governance level. But of course, Sanford has at the same time traveled through some pretty challenging water. It's the oldest company on the New Zealand Stock Exchange, but I think that in the time that I've been chairman, the waters have been pretty choppy with COVID and with the developments overseas. So I don't really want to be up here sort of putting the knife into every person that's basically had a senior role in the company over time. It's sort of appropriate to do that.
But essentially, I think essentially having the right leadership comprised with the right leader in particular, the Chief Executive is very important, I think everybody will know, but also so is the Chairman of the Board, and then essentially ensuring that the strategy for the company is correct. Again, reasonably rhetorical answer, but it is the answer, and I think that with the right people that we've assembled in the company, that we are in a position to achieve well. The company is fundamentally a good company with good prospects and good assets. And I think perhaps just to close, the result that we've had to the 30th of September just now is the strongest bottom-line result the company has ever had. So it's a standout year relative to all of the ones that came before it, including the ones prior to my arrival on the board.
Any other questions from the floor?
No. Just from what you're saying, do you see the full term of your appointment at this stage, or are you really saying this is your final appointment to the board?
The appointment at the ASM has run for three years, obviously, in terms of the maximum period that you can run. Given that I'm at nine years, I think essentially New Zealand doesn't have a formal rule for tenure, but I'm conscious of the fact that my tenure is running close to the limit of what would generally be accepted as commercial practice. So I reserve that decision to be developed by myself and the board in the next term, which runs me up to the next ASM. The maximum time that I can go before I reappear here would be a three-year period. So that would be the maximum at which time shareholders will have the opportunity of revisiting, and ultimately, the shareholders do have the final say.
But what occurs prior to that time right now is not exactly decided, but I am cognizant of the fact that the tenure is basically at the outer end or approaching the outer end of the spectrum of commercial practice.
Any other questions? Stuart, over to you.
Yes. We have another question from Mr. Paul Grant. Is a NZD 5 share price attainable over the next two years?
Is a NZD 5 share price attainable over the next.
There's a NZD 5 share price attainable over the next, did you say two years?
Two years.
Two years. Well, again, theoretically, yes. Now we're at NZD 4.20 or thereabouts, NZD 0.80 over two years. I don't think I'd be sticking my neck out and saying that that's within the realms of possibility. For many of us shareholders, we have entry prices on our own shares, including myself, that's higher than that, somewhat higher than that. So the motivation is definitely there. So the answer is yes.
But that's not tipping or encouraging trading. Any other questions, Stuart? Back to you, Rob.
Thank you, John. So we now come to resolution five, remuneration of the auditor. KPMG are the existing auditors of Sanford. Pursuant to Section 207T of the Companies Act, KPMG are automatically reappointed as auditors for the ensuing year. The board seeks the approval of shareholders to be authorized to fix the remuneration of KPMG for the fiscal '25 financial year. I now move as an ordinary resolution that the directors be authorized to fix the remuneration of the auditor for the year ended 30 September 2025. Are there any questions on this resolution from the floor? No. Stuart, are there any questions online? No. Thank you, Stuart. So.
Resolution six.
Resolution six. And the room? Just read that out. Or do we just go? I now move.
No, I think you said it.
David requested shares as part of his remuneration package. We believe that share options align, David, with the interests of the shareholders. I now move as an ordinary resolution that in accordance with NZX Listing Rule 4.2.1, 1.8 million options to acquire ordinary shares in the company be issued to David Mair under the company's Long-Term Incentive Option Plan on the terms and conditions set out in the explanatory notes to this resolution. Are there any questions on this resolution from the floor? No. Stuart, are there any questions online? No. So, ladies and gentlemen, that concludes our discussion on the resolutions. If you wish to vote on the resolutions, whether in person or online, you should do so now as I will shortly close the voting. Once all the votes have been cast, they will be counted by the company's share registrar, Computershare.
The results of today's meeting will be released to the NZX on the completion of verification of voting. I will now pause to allow you time to finalize your votes. Okay. I will now declare that voting is closed. For those of you here in the room, I now ask. Well, actually, that's happened. All right. Thank you very much. So coming to general business is the next and last item. At this point, we'll open the floor to any questions on Sanford's performance in other matters that shareholders now wish to raise, including questions submitted online during the meeting. A reminder, please, to state your name and whether you are a shareholder or proxy holder. So I will now take questions from the floor. Are there any? Yes.
My name is John Reddan, shareholder. I was just wondering if the inventory level, which was, I think, about NZD 72 million at the end of the financial year, is that where you see it staying? Is that sort of a comfortable level?
David, I might. Yeah. Yeah, you too.
No. No, no. Seriously, I explained in my address earlier that we've had a focus on certainly aged inventory, but as I said, you can only sell inventory once. So, of course, there's a slight cycle depending on the inventory. So sometimes you catch more than you can sell in a period, or you might. But the idea of carrying inventory over for year after year doesn't fit my view of how to run business. It's frozen cash, and we can use that cash. So there's a lot of effort going. So I did emphasize in the first half, there was a very good effort by particularly Le Bouc and his team to sell through some aged inventory. It's still a key area of focus because it is a quick way to improve cash flow.
So at what level? You must be aiming at a certain?
No. The first aim is not to have inventory older than three years, then not to have inventory older than two years. I don't want to get into the numbers.
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Are there any other questions here? There's one further on my left.
Yes. Lyle Paice, shareholder. Just one question, if I may. Have you managed to balance the supply of mussels out yet? What's actually happening there that there seems to be a shortage of mussels? Am I right or wrong on that?
Well, they're selling very, very easily, so, David, at this point.
I think one way of looking at it is the demand for frozen half-shell mussels has remained strong. But remember, every year there's a kind of a cycle where most mussel production shuts down during spawning and for other reasons. Four to six weeks, usually August. August, yeah. And there's a big build-up of not inventory, but a big build-up of demand through till Christmas. So we're very fortunate at the moment that demand is strong and pricing is holding up. So the issue was the shortage of. I didn't understand that. Sorry. There was a shortage of spat. So there's been some issues about actually growing mussels and things like that. But look, overall, I think we're well-positioned. Thank you.
Any other questions from the floor? Okay. Yes, over here.
Yeah. This question I would like to raise to Craig. Yeah. Last AGM, I mentioned about selling mussels to Canada, and I noticed that you have written down notes, etc., and what's the results then? I think that's good, isn't it? Because of the half-year ending results, the mussels exports, the profits jumped from NZD 2.2 million to net profit of, I think, 9 point something million. Is it that you were successful to exporting that to Canada? Please tell me.
Well, the half-year result was really an amalgam of sales, strong sales, getting our discipline and integrity in the U.S. and China in a much better shape than it had been. Did we send a lot of mussels to Canada? No. The pricing that we achieved in other markets was better than the pricing that we could have in Canada. And we look to support the excellent range of customers that purchased our product then and continue to purchase our product.
Yeah. Thank you. And another question is, how do I know that the salmon in the supermarket is from Sanford or from Regal Salmon? Because I don't like Regal Salmon at all because quite a number of years ago, I read the Consumer Magazine, and they mentioned that the Regal Salmon, they were fed off rubbish, all rubbish. And one of my good friends in Wellington, she likes the Regal Salmon, and she died of cancer, died of cancer. I'm still very, very upset. Then can you tell me in which supermarket I can buy real salmon besides New World? New World, they have the salmon package saying that is the Sanford one.
Okay. Thank you. Vaughan, could you perhaps answer that question?
At New World, I can say any Foodstuffs supermarkets.
Foodstuffs, yeah.
New World.
I can say any of the new Foodstuffs supermarkets.
Yeah. But then PAK'nSAVE, I have asked them, they also sell Regal Salmon. How do I distinguish among them?
It's called Big Glory Bay Salmon.
Glory Bay.
Big Glory Bay Salmon. Just be specific on the request.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
Big Glory Bay. Yeah.
Everybody listen. B G B Salmon. Big Glory Bay.
Yeah. Thank you. In order to live long. Thank you.
Thank you. All right. Any other questions here? Stuart, online?
Chair, I've got one more online question from Mr. Paul Grant. Is current year-to-date cost parity] running ahead of the prior comparable period?
I think the answer is yes. Is the YTD PCP higher than last year's?
We've had a good start to the year. We won't get numbers.
Yes. There was a continuous disclosure issue there, so in reality. So we're pleased enough with the result. Let's put it that way to date. Any other questions online? No. Thank you. So there appears to be no further questions. A t this juncture, I would like to now thank you all for your attendance. Appreciate you all being here and participating in the meeting. I now declare the meeting closed, and I invite you all to join with the directors and management for afternoon tea and refreshments, and can I also wish you all a very Merry Christmas and festive season and Happy New Year. Thank you.