Good morning, everyone. My name is Lino A. Saputo, Chair of the Board and CEO of Saputo. I welcome you to this shareholders' meeting, and thank you for joining us today. I am joined by Mr. Maxime Therrien, CFO and Secretary of the company, who will act as secretary for this meeting. Mr. Kai Bockmann, President and COO, and Ms. Lydia Pham, Senior VP, Legal Affairs, who will act as moderator. Also joining us remotely are our directors and members of our executive team. Once again this year, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the annual meeting is being held in a virtual-only format. Before starting the proceedings, I would like to say a few words about the general conduct of the meeting. While the formal business of the meeting will be presented predominantly in English, we are offering simultaneous translation to French.
We are also offering an original language option should you wish to listen to this meeting without any translation at all. Registered shareholders and duly appointed proxy holders who have logged in using their control number can submit or ask questions during the meeting. Shareholders logged in as guests are able to attend the meeting but will not be able to vote or ask questions. Based on your preference, we invite you to submit your questions in either French or English, and we will respond in the same language. Registered shareholders and duly appointed proxy holders can submit a question in writing or ask a question in real time over the phone during the meeting by clicking on the messaging icon. You will see a text box. In the text box, you can choose to write your question or enter your phone number.
If you provide your phone number, an operator will call you when it's time to ask your question. Your phone number will not be shared with the other meeting attendees. You can submit questions at any time during the meeting. We encourage you to do so as early as possible starting now. If your question is related to a formal item of business, please clearly identify the applicable item so your question can be considered during the discussion on this item. Following the formal portion of the meeting, we will have a question and answer period. Any question not specifically related to an item of formal business will be considered during the question and answer session, time permitting. Our moderator will receive the written questions and read them out loud before a member of management answers. Our moderator will also manage the questions coming in over the phone.
In the interest of fairness, please limit yourself to two questions at most and speak concisely. If we are unable to answer your question during the allotted time, we will follow up with you after the meeting if you have provided a contact information with your question. We may combine questions from different shareholders about the same topic to avoid repetition. We reserve the right to dismiss questions related to personal grievances or claims, or which are deemed inappropriate or irrelevant to the meeting. At this meeting, during management's presentation or during the Q&A portion, we may make statements containing forward-looking information. These statements are based on assumptions and are subject to important risks and uncertainties, and our actual results could differ materially as a result.
I refer you to the cautionary statements regarding forward-looking information in our annual report and the Risks and Uncertainties section of our management's discussion and analysis dated June 3, 2021, which can be accessed by clicking the Documents icon on your screen. I would now like to nominate Ms. Nadine Gauthier and Ms. Gail Nymick of Computershare Investor Services Inc. as scrutineers of this meeting. The scrutineers have provided a report on the attendance, and I confirm that the requisite quorum of shareholders is present or represented by proxy at this meeting. The matters to be discussed at today's meeting are set out in the Management Information Circular dated June 3, 2021. The company used the notice and access regime to make available its meeting materials and sent a notice with all relevant information to all shareholders on or around June 22, 2021.
The circular and the notice of meeting are available on our website, which can be accessed by clicking the Documents icon on your screen. All our disclosure documents are also available under the company's profile on SEDAR. Accordingly, I will dispense with the reading of the notice of the meeting. Our transfer agent, Computershare, has attested to the proper mailing of the applicable meeting materials. I therefore declare this meeting to be duly convened and properly constituted to conduct the business of the company. I propose to omit the reading of the minutes of the annual meeting held August 6, 2020, and that they can be considered adopted. The minutes will be kept in the company's books at its registered office and will be available for consultation by any shareholder. We will now proceed with the voting instructions.
You can vote online if you are a registered shareholder or a duly appointed proxy holder, provided you have logged in using the control number you received. The voting at today's meeting will be conducted by a single online ballot. If you already voted by proxy, there is no need for you to vote online since your vote will be recorded in accordance with your proxy instructions. However, if you wish to change a previously submitted vote, you can click on the Voting icon. Polls are now open for voting on all items of business to be voted and the meeting as described in the Management Information Circular. As chair, I will move all motions and no motions will need to be seconded. Once discussion has concluded on all items of business, a short period will be allotted to submit your votes.
I will then declare voting closed on all matters of business. The preliminary voting results will be announced prior to the close of the meeting. The first item of business is the presentation of the financial statements. A copy of the company's financial statements and the auditor's report for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2021 was made available to the requisite shareholders under our profile on SEDAR and our website on June 3, 2021. At this time, Max will make a few remarks on our fiscal 2021 and Q1 financial results. We will then continue with a presentation by Kai, followed by myself. Max, the floor is all yours.
Good morning, and thank you for joining us virtually today as I give an overview of our financial performance for fiscal 2021 and also for our first quarter of fiscal 2022 that ended June 30. As the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic impacted our performance in fiscal 2021, it also highlighted the resilience and the strength of our business and our agility to pivot and adapt to changing conditions. As the severity of the pandemic evolved throughout the year, facets of our operation pivoted in response, meeting shifts in consumer demand head on. On the retail side, we capitalize on the waves of pantry loading, leveraging the power of our retail portfolio, our brand power, and tailoring our offering to match changing consumption patterns.
On the other hand, our food service market segment was hit hard and performed below historical levels all fiscal year as public health restriction limited activities in this space. We felt it most in our USA Sector due to its large food service footprint. Predominantly driven by export sales, the industrial market segment was also challenged, but we began to see a recovery in the second half of fiscal 2021 as our as International markets began to reopen. Over the year, we remain disciplined in all aspect of our business, that served us very well during these unprecedented times. In terms of revenue, the Canada Sector represent 29% of our business. The USA Sector represent 43%, the International Sector 22%, finally our Europe Sector 6%.
Consolidated revenue decreased by 4% at CAD 14.3 billion and adjusted EBITDA was relatively flat at CAD 1.47 billion. As our most balanced platform from a market segment mix standpoint, our Dairy Division Canada was able to navigate the pandemic effectively. Overall, we benefited from higher retail and industrial market segment sales and lower administrative costs, which outweighed decreased sales volume within the food service market segment. Revenue increased 3% and adjusted EBITDA increased by 11%. We continue to believe in our strategy, which focuses on innovation, efficiencies, and profitable volume. As always, our customer relationship and our supply chain network play a key role in building our future success. In the USA sector, revenue decreased by 14% and adjusted EBITDA decreased 8% as a result of the COVID-19 related shift in consumer demand.
While the volatile commodities market played in our favor, resulting in a positive contribution of approximately CAD 57 million, lower sales volume, particularly in the foodservice market segment, affected efficiencies and the absorption of our fixed cost. Our retail brands maintain leading market share position in our core cheese products. In the international sector, revenue increased by 5%, and we saw improvement in all market segments. Despite varying government-imposed lockdowns throughout the year, we benefited from additional sales volume in our export markets, although lower international cheese and dairy ingredient market prices put downward pressure on our margins. Adjusted EBITDA remained flat and was positively impacted by higher sales volume and improved operational efficiency derived from increased milk availability. In the Europe sector, the Dairy Division U.K. contributed positively with a revenue increase of 7% and adjusted EBITDA increase of 6%.
As a result of the pandemic, we saw higher sales volume in the retail market segment, fueled by increased consumer demand. This helped the division maintain its position as the largest manufacturer of branded cheese in the United Kingdom. Revenue, however, were negatively impacted by lower sales volume in the industrial market segment, particularly in the dairy ingredient category. In fiscal 2021, net earnings rose 7% to CAD 626 million. Adjusted net earnings, excluding amortization of intangible assets related to business acquisition, were CAD 715 million for the year, down CAD 9 million. Our net cash generated from operating activities was up 4%, continuing to reach over CAD 1 billion annually. We've historically benefited from strong and consistent cash flows generated by our operations, this remained true despite the pressure of the pandemic.
With financial discipline in mind, in fiscal 2021, we allocated these funds toward capital expenditure, payment of dividend, and debt repayment. As we navigate throughout to what we would hope is the tail end of COVID-19 pandemic, we stayed the course on our cash management strategy and cash flow generation. Our current capital allocation priorities are aligned with our new four-year global strategic plan and our focus on investing wisely to support organic growth, business operation, and our brands. The strong financial position we built over the years and maintained during the pandemic enabled us to forge ahead on our plans and commitments. We made capital investment to support our future growth, though some project timelines were adjusted or delayed due to the pandemic.
In fiscal 2021, we spent a total of CAD 433 million in property, plant and equipment, and also intangible assets related to our ERP initiatives. We also increased our dividend as we've done so every year since our IPO. During the fiscal year, we paid CAD 285 million in dividend to our valued shareholder, CAD 205 million paid in cash and CAD 80 million settled through our dividend reinvestment plan. Moving on to fiscal 2022, today, we reported our first quarter results, We're still facing headwinds as the shift in consumer demand due to the COVID-19 pandemic continue to impact all of our op sectors to different degrees. Consolidated revenue reached close to CAD 3.5 billion, an increase of 2.9%. Our adjusted EBITDA declined 21% to CAD 290 million.
During the quarter, our results were negatively impacted by U.S. market factors, inflationary pressure on input costs in all of our division, especially as it relates to freight and logistics. Also impacting by supply chain challenges in our international sector, which negatively impacted our export sales volume. Of note, however, food service sales volume were higher than those of the first quarter of fiscal 2021, driving our overall sales volume to be above those of the same quarter last fiscal. In Canada, specifically, sales volume in the food service market segment showed sign of improvement as well. Increased sales volume in the food service market segment outweighed lower retail market segment volume, which were down again against elevated pantry loading numbers last year. In the U.S.A., higher sales volume in the food service market segment helped lift our results.
In addition, consumer demand for mozzarella in this market segment started to recover, but the scene in this space remains very competitive. Internationally, impacting our bottom line, we felt the weight of supply chain challenges on export side, such as container shortages and port inefficiencies. Lower export sales volume and intensify competition around milk supply in our Dairy Division Australia, ultimately affected operational efficiencies and the absorption of our fixed cost. In our Europe sector, we were up against an impressive retail sales volume figure from last year, which resulted from the pandemic-related pantry loading, much like in Canada. As a result, sales volume in the retail market segment were lower as compared to the same quarter last fiscal year.
This decrease was offset by the positive impact from a higher industrial market segment sales volume, mainly in the dairy ingredient category. As we navigate through the lingering disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic, we strongly believe that we are well-positioned to face current market condition, given our solid financial foundation, business diversification, and our longstanding history of being a responsible operator. Keeping a solid balance sheet, we target a net debt to EBITDA ratio of approximately 2.25 times on a long-term basis. As of June 30, 2021, this ratio was 2.88. We have the financial agility to invest in CapEx project related to our global strategic plan and the Saputo Promise, agility to facilitate funding for future acquisition, and agility to fuel our growth ambition.
Again this year, our board of director has revised our dividend policy upward and has approved a quarterly dividend of CAD 0.18 per share, representing a 2.9% increase. This will be payable on September 17, 2021 to common shareholder of record on September 7. As we look toward the rest of the year, we are focused on controlling the controllables and moving our business forward. Our shareholders can rest assured that in fiscal 2022, we plan to leverage our strength and our operational agility to support our growth plans. We have a big year ahead of us with the execution of our four-year global strategic plan well underway, which Kai will speak to shortly.
Despite challenging market condition, we'll be forging ahead in pursuing growth while we continue to invest with a view of long-term profitability for our business, keeping the creation of value at the forefront of our priorities. I would like to thank you for your time today and for your ongoing support. I'll now turn it over to Kai.
Good morning, everyone. Fiscal 2021 was a pivotal time in Saputo's history. It was a year filled with challenges and uncertainty, but also opportunities. As such, I'd like to underscore some of our key accomplishments and developments from this past year. Due to pandemic-related changes in consumer demand, we retooled certain food service-specific facilities to take advantage of the healthy retail market segment. We supported our customers with tips and insights as they were also forced to adapt their businesses. The pandemic changed how consumers purchased food, cooking more at home, stocking up on comforting staples, and using online channels. In response, our divisions expanded their digital marketing presence, and we ramped up our B2B and B2C efforts via third-party online channels. In-house, we launched our first e-commerce retail platform, the Saputo Fridge, in Canada, offering consumers limited shelf life over stock products at reduced prices.
We followed that up with a direct-to-consumer site for our Davidstow premium cheddar brand in the U.K. Both platforms were successful and equipped us with great learnings as we look to continue our e-commerce journey. Despite the added complexities of navigating a pandemic, each division came through with some exciting wins. In Canada, we completed cheese capacity expansions at two of our plants in response to rising demand, and we worked towards finalizing the construction of our new state-of-the-art fluid milk and dairy alternative beverage facility in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia, opening this month. With network optimization always top of mind, we closed two aging facilities as planned. On the commercial front, we grew our market share in all our key retail categories.
We maintained our focus on growing our cheese portfolio by leveraging our market-leading brands, including our repositioned Armstrong Everyday Cheese brand, whose new packaging, convenient formats, and bold new flavors resonated well with consumers. The big story out of the U.S. was the merge of our two former divisions into One USA. Last August, we created a single and more agile Dairy Division USA, effectively combining our cheese and dairy food activities. This new streamlined structure will deliver synergies in all aspects of our U.S. business and help fast-track the growth ambitions of our largest platform. The benefits of going to market with a single voice were already noticeable in fiscal 2021. In the retail market segment in particular, we expanded our private label sales in various categories and increased distribution of our market-leading Frigo Cheese Heads range.
From an operational perspective, we continue to invest in our network to capitalize on growing categories such as string cheese, ultra-filtered milk, and dairy alternative beverages. Speaking of, we rolled out our first almond and oat beverages through co-packing arrangements. We successfully trialed the mozzarella alternative developed by our U.K. innovation team with some of our key U.S. food service partners. This new product has the right taste and sensory attributes and performs very well on a pizza, which provides us with a competitive advantage as we seek to take a leadership position in the largely untapped plant-based cheese category. During the year, we also successfully completed Harmony ERP deployments in 9 facilities in the U.S. To support One USA, we appointed Carl Colizza as President and COO, in addition to his North American responsibilities. We welcome Lyne Castonguay as the division's new Deputy President and COO.
Lyne is a seasoned leader with an extensive retail experience, and she'll be taking over the reins from Carl in the coming year, so he can focus on his role as President and COO, North America. In Australia, we continue to focus our efforts on higher margin categories like cheese and butter. We were very busy on the commercial side, bringing new products to market and refreshing key brands. We successfully repositioned our lactose-free Liddells brand and expanded its offering. It's now our fastest-growing brand in everyday cheddar from a volume standpoint. Our leading Coon brand underwent a well-thought-out name change. After careful consideration, we made the decision to rebrand to Cheer, to honor the brand affinity felt by our valued consumers, while being mindful of our current attitudes and perspectives.
Operationally, we maintain our efforts to optimize our network and completed the integration of the specialty cheese business of Lion Dairy & Drinks, with the brands we inherited continuing to outperform our original projections. In Argentina, we leveraged our solid standing to capture additional milk volumes as the pandemic forced smaller players to exit the industry. We kept finding new ways to push our highly efficient platform even further by utilizing automation and increasing our cheese productivity. The retail market segment performed extremely well with our popular La Paulina cheese brand celebrating its 100th anniversary. On the export side, our team in Argentina earned the top spot in the 2020 ranking of Latin America cheese exporters. We were pleased to appoint Marcelo Cohen, who's been with us for almost 20 years, to the role of president and COO for our Dairy Division Argentina.
During fiscal 2021, our Dairy Division U.K. capitalized on its retail brand power. Among others, our category-leading Cathedral City cheese captured additional market share domestically, and it was successfully introduced within our North American divisions, where we secured nationwide distribution with sales volumes outpacing original projections. Our Vitalite Dairy Free brand underwent a packaging refresh, highlighting its plant-based messaging. The U.K.'s top spray oil brand, Frylight, experienced healthy growth. We also shifted its production to another facility for increased efficiencies with lower overheads. Brexit had very little impact on our activities, and our Davidstow capacity expansion progressed as planned, positioning us to be able to seize new opportunities for increased cheese distribution beyond U.K. borders.
In the fall, Leanne Cutts, an accomplished executive with a wealth of experience in the food and beverage, consumer healthcare, and banking industries, will be joining us as president and COO, International and Europe. As our business grows, this change in reporting structure will allow me to focus on my strategic role as president and COO for Saputo Inc. Transitioning to fiscal 2022, we were proud to unveil our new four-year global strategic plan designed to accelerate organic growth across our business and reinforce our position as one of the world's leading dairy processors. It's an integral part of our well-defined growth strategy, combining organic growth and strategic acquisitions with the Saputo Promise underpinning all our efforts. The plan builds on the momentum of our fiscal 2021 accomplishments. It was developed from the ground up, fueled by each division's leadership team and our COVID learnings.
We're targeting a high single-digit adjusted EBITDA compound annual growth rate over the four-year period to reach CAD 2.125 billion by the end of fiscal 2025, which is approximately 44% higher than where we ended fiscal 2021. We expect roughly 70% of this projected growth to be generated by internal initiatives aimed at optimizing and enhancing our operations. The remaining 30% is linked to initiatives designed to enhance our top line and drive profitable sales volume growth at more than double the rate of global per capita dairy consumption in all our geographies. The exception to this would be Australia, where we don't see the milk pool growing beyond current levels.
It's important to note that our progress may not be linear, and that we expect the benefits to be more significant in the second half once our planned operational efficiencies kick in. That said, we're confident we'll see growth every single year of the plan, despite the challenging market conditions in the first quarter of fiscal 2022. The U.S.A. sector will be the biggest contributor in helping us achieve our growth ambitions. Striking the right balance from a market segmentation standpoint is key to our success. We're focusing heavily on initiatives geared towards the retail market segment, particularly in the U.S., where historical activities skewed towards food service. We intend to achieve our target by focusing on 5 strategic pillars: strengthening our core business; accelerating product innovation, which includes our efforts related to dairy alternatives; increasing the value of our ingredients portfolio.
In terms of the respective contribution to our adjusted EBITDA growth over the four-year period, these first 3 pillars are all expected to contribute to similar levels. The next pillar, optimizing and enhancing operations, which is an area Saputo has a proven track record in, should drive the majority of our progress. It will also require the biggest CapEx investment. Finally, creating enablers to fuel investments. Due to the long-term nature of the anticipated benefits generated by the pillar's initiatives, we see it as having the smallest contribution over the plan's four-year span. To support the execution of our plan, we intend to deploy CAD 2.3 billion in CapEx over the next four years. About half the amount will go towards our base or stay-in-business capital investments, including those related to Harmony, and the other half will support the plan's strategic initiatives.
We expect a larger portion of these funds to be allocated in the next two years, particularly to optimize and enhance our operations, which should act as a catalyst for increased margins through cost efficiencies and contribute significantly to the achievement of our growth target. We look forward to providing you with quarterly updates as we ramp up the execution of our organic growth plan. I'll now pass it over to Lino.
Today, I am pleased to share with you our many accomplishments aimed at further strengthening our backbone, the Saputo Promise. Before I do, I'll quickly recap some of our COVID-19 relief efforts, of which we're extremely proud. Within the landscape of uncertainty in fiscal 2021, as an organization, we strive to find the calm. We stood firm in our values, and above all, aimed to do the right thing for all stakeholders. At the core of our company, we prioritize the safety, financial security, and well-being of our valued employees. I remain deeply grateful for the ongoing efforts. Through their hard work and dedication, we sit on a solid footing, and thankfully, we're seeing a transition to recovery in many of the regions we operate in, although clearly, we're not out of the woods yet.
As an extension of our family, we also took this opportunity to lend a helping hand to our farmer suppliers, supporting them with additional resources to help alleviate the mental and physical impacts of the pandemic. Keeping those most vulnerable in our communities in mind as well, we gave generously to those who needed it most. In tandem with those efforts, we remain focused on creating shared value for all stakeholders, and our sound foundations enabled us to stay the course. I'm pleased to say that in fiscal 2021, we drove each of our seven pillars forward in many ways. Our 2021 Saputo Promise report, published this morning and featured on our website, outlines our progress in managing key environmental, social, and governance aspects of our business. To start, we're very proud that taking care of our people has landed us on Forbes 2020 World's Best Employers list.
Under this important pillar, we've been busy, especially when it comes to our approach to health and safety. To help embed our safety principles and solution mindset throughout our operations during the fiscal year, we established our Safety Ambassadors Network. More than 90 dedicated employees now act as change agents across our sites. During the year, we also implemented several programs and initiatives to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace, including unconscious bias training, expanded parental leave benefits, gender-neutral job descriptions, and arrangement programs. Moreover, I was pleased to join the Catalyst for Change initiative as part of our commitment to accelerating progress towards gender equality. Over the fiscal year, we've also dedicated considerable efforts towards our environmental pillar. We made tremendous strides towards our 2025 environmental plan targets, allocating investments to complete 12 specific projects across our network.
These should deliver notable climate, water, and waste savings. A further 24 projects will be funded in fiscal 2022. Today, we amended our $1 billion U.S. dollar revolving credit facility, which is now sustainably linked and introduces an annual pricing adjustment based on the achievement of key climate and water targets in line with our 2025 commitments. During the fiscal year, we also laid the groundwork on how we intend to address environmental considerations beyond the scope of our operations. This led to the development of our supply chain pledges announced today. We're committed to doing our part in creating a sustainable and equitable food system. Among other things, by 2025, we pledge to contribute CAD 10 million to fund relevant initiatives and source 100% of our principal ingredients sustainably.
In the coming months, we will put the execution stage of our plan in motion. In fiscal 2021, we also continued to examine the nutritional value of our offering. We completed the mapping of our global portfolio as part of our new nutrient profiling model set to be launched in fiscal 2022. We strongly believe in the nutritional benefits of dairy, and a key component of our new strategic plan will be on increasing the value of our ingredients portfolio. We will continue to explore ways to leverage the benefits of dairy for people of all ages. As for our community pillar, giving back has always been a fundamental part of our culture. Today, more than ever, we believe in the lasting value of leaving a meaningful legacy where our employees live, work, and play.
In fiscal 2021, we exceeded our commitment with an overall community investment valued at more than CAD 17 million. That's doubling our target of 1% of our pre-tax profit. In acquisition news, our recently materialized transactions will serve as accelerators to our global strategic plan. This past May, we were delighted to welcome Bute Island Foods and the wealth of knowledge they bring in dairy alternative cheeses where we intend to take a leadership position. Prior to the transaction, the innovative team there was manufacturing the mozzarella alternative we had developed and successfully trialed with key food service accounts. Among other benefits, this transaction gives us in-house manufacturing capabilities and expertise in this space as we work to secure new business on a global scale. On this side of the pond, we added the Reedsburg facility of Wisconsin Specialty Protein to our operations in May.
This facility manufactures value-added ingredients such as goat whey, organic lactose, and other dairy powders. The integration has progressed nicely so far as we evaluate our ingredients portfolio in order to develop specialized whey products to bring to market in the U.S. as well as internationally. As the U.S. is the largest contributor to the successful execution of the plan, in June, we opened an executive office in Miami, Florida, to serve as a meeting place for our global and divisional teams to meet while increasing the presence of our executives in the U.S., including myself, to help support our strategy. The Bute Island Foods and Reedsburg acquisitions were both considered in the development of our plan. Therefore, their expected growth is embedded in our organic growth targets.
More recently, we added Wensleydale Dairy Products and its talented team of over 210 employees to our Saputo Dairy UK roster. With this acquisition, we aim to expand our brand portfolio and diversify our existing range of British cheeses with a leading U.K. brand. We are very optimistic we will have further transactions during this fiscal year. As we stand, our tank is full, and our pipeline is plentiful, and we are well-positioned to seize new growth opportunities. We are targeting a selection of acquisition files in the priority areas of cheese, value-added products and ingredients, U.S. retail, and dairy alternative products. We have our sights keenly set on regions in the U.S. and Europe as both these regions offer opportunities for further synergies with our current operations. The potential for acquisitions in Latin America and Oceania are also interesting.
Looking ahead, I see a very, very bright future for our business. As always, we're in a position to control our own destiny, bringing value to all stakeholders, including our loyal shareholders. While we're only just embarked on a four-year plan, in the first quarter, we made good progress under each pillar. We're confident in our ability to deliver as each initiative brings us one step closer to achieving our plan, and that's pretty ambitious. We thank you for your time today and for supporting us as we leverage 67 years of history and expertise, including the many lessons learned from the pandemic, to become even bigger, better, and stronger. The next item of business on the agenda, the election of directors. The board proposes that the current 10 members be nominated for election to the board. The biographies are included in the management information circular.
I nominate the following 10 persons for election as Directors of the company to hold office until the next meeting of shareholders or until their successors are elected. Louis-Philippe Carrière, Henry E. Demone, Anthony M. Fata, Annalisa King, Karen Kinsley, Tony Meti, Diane Nyisztor, Franziska Ruf, Annette Verschuren, and myself, Lino Anthony Saputo. Each of the persons nominated has confirmed that he or she is prepared to serve as a Director if elected by the shareholders. Lydia, have any nominations or questions come in from shareholders specifically on this item?
Mr. Chair, I confirm that we have not received any questions on this item.
Thank you, Lydia. As previously noted, registered shareholders or their duly appointed proxy holders can vote by online ballot by selecting the applicable voting options on the voting panel displayed on their screens. The next item of business is the appointment of auditors. I move that KPMG be appointed auditors of the company to hold office until the next annual meeting of shareholders, and that the board be authorized to fix their remuneration. Deloitte LLP had been the auditors of the company since 1992 and audited our financial statements for fiscal 2021. In fiscal 2021, the audit committee initiated a review of external audit services as part of its continued commitment to good governance. As part of this review, we sought proposals from audit services for fiscal 2022.
After careful review of the proposals and due consideration of all relevant factors, the audit committee recommended to the board of directors that KPMG and not Deloitte be nominated at the meeting for appointment as auditor of the company. Lydia, have any questions come in from shareholders specifically on this motion?
No, Mr. Chair. I confirm that we've not received any questions on this motion.
Thank you, Lydia. As previously noted, polls are open for voting on all items. The next item of business is the adoption of an advisory non-binding resolution in respect of the company's approach to executive compensation. I move that on an advisory basis and not to diminish the role and responsibilities of the board. The shareholders accept the company's approach to executive compensation disclosed in the management information circular, delivered in connection with the 2021 annual shareholders meeting. Lydia, have any questions come in from shareholders specifically on this motion or any other motion discussed today?
No, I confirm that we've not received any questions from shareholders specifically on this motion or on any other formal item.
Thank you, Lydia. As previously noted, polls are open for voting on all items. We have now concluded discussions on all items of business other than shareholder proposals, and the polls will close in a few moments. A simple majority of votes cast by proxy or online will constitute approval of the matters considered today. Following discussions with the company, the shareholders making the shareholder proposals have agreed that their proposals would not be put to vote. We will therefore discuss these proposals once we have concluded on all formal items of business for today's meeting. We will now take a 30-second pause to allow those of you who have not yet submitted your vote to do so now. That concludes the voting at today's meeting. The scrutineers confirm the following preliminary voting results.
Based on the proxies received, the 10 directors nominated in the management information circular received at least 95% votes for. Approximately 98% of votes are favorable to the appointment of KPMG as auditors. The advisory resolution on executive compensation is approved with approximately 98% of the votes in favor. A report disclosing the final voting results for each applicable item of business will be filed on SEDAR promptly following the meeting, and a report on the election of each director will be disclosed in a press release to be issued following the meeting. We will now turn to the shareholder proposals. We received five shareholder proposals in connection with this meeting. None of these proposals is put to a vote at the meeting today. The first shareholder proposal is from Mr. Anthony J. Pullman, a holder of common shares.
The full text of Mr. Pullman's proposal, titled Palm Oil, is provided in the management information circular for your information. Following discussions with the company, Mr. Pullman has agreed not to hold a vote on this proposal. [Non-English content]
The Movement of Education Defense.
Following discussions with the company, the MÉDAC has agreed not to hold a vote on these proposals. The full text of the four shareholder proposals of the MÉDAC is provided in the management information circular for information purposes only. Although no vote will be held on their proposals, the MÉDAC has asked to discuss their proposals at the meeting.
We are now going to hand over the mic to Mr. Willie Gagnon, representative of MÉDAC. Mr. Gagnon, please go ahead.
Yes, Mr. President, can you hear me?
Yes, Mr. Gagnon, welcome this morning. We can hear you quite well.
Thank you. Thank you. I will introduce myself as usual. You just said my name. My name is Willie Gagnon. I am with the Mouvement Éducation Défense Actionnaire. We've been celebrating this year our 25 years, which has brought us to send you a few proposals, one which wishes to underscore this anniversary. I'll present to you very briefly. Just explaining to you all shareholders, the reasons why we have accepted to not require a vote on these proposals. It was for us to have a formal reason, which was already done at Saputo. We already know very well what the promise, the Saputo Promise is.
The proposal was also so that the board and the committees be charged with ensuring the follow-up of that Promise is what we can see in your answer on page 78 of the circular in French, where the mandate is described of each of the committee says that from now on, that each of the committees will supervise the elements of the Saputo Promise that have been delegated to them by the board, and we are happy with this change. This is something that we wish to have, and it is something that Saputo did, and we sent you a proposal on the virtual assemblies, and we are very happy to be able to intervene verbally and that that possibility be offered to all shareholders of MÉDAC, which is the reason why we did not require that a vote be held on this proposal.
We had sent a proposal on the discretionary power of the Board, as well as the Compensation Committee for the fixing of remuneration. We got in the answer of the company, the elements of information that we wished to receive. We're happy about that. We had also sent a proposal on the accountability for things linked to climate, water, and waste. We're happy to see that the company, in its answer, is publishing an annual document on the Saputo Promise that was published this morning, if I understand correctly. This document contains quantitative performance indicator, and that is the most important thing in our opinion, that the information that you were promising to us be supplied to us in a quantitative way. That is really what is important in this matter, and we are very happy with the commitment of the company on this.
Mr. President, thank you so much not only for your attention today, but for all the efforts that you have brought to the discussions that you have taken over with us. Thank you again.
Thank you, Mr. Gagnon. I appreciate your comments. I also wish to thank the entire MÉDAC and its representative, Willie Gagnon, his team, for the discussions that we've had on these issues. We would like to refer you on the answers of the company on each of the proposal that were announced by the MÉDAC in the solicitation circular.
Portion of the meeting, we would like to answer any of the questions you may have. I remind you, registered shareholders and duly appointed proxy holders who have logged in using their control number can ask their questions in either French or English by clicking on the messaging icon. We would like to remind you, questions which were already answered or that are redundant or repetitive may not be answered. Lydia, have any questions come in from shareholders?
Yes, Mr. Chairman, we do have a question that came in from the MÉDAC, which I will read. [Foreign language] Monsieur Willie Gagnon pour le compte du MÉDAC. It was announced at the beginning of the assembly that it would mainly be in English, which was the case. Why is that the case? In the past years, the assembly was held in French. The company is in Quebec. This is a state with a French language. This is not showing much respect for the worldwide linguistic diversity that is incarnated by our company, starting with the Constitution and our Charter of Rights. It is deplorable. It is the social responsibility of the company and its good governance, the respect of its stakeholders.
Thank you for that question, Mr. Gagnon. Listen, we have translation in both languages for all shareholders who wanted to hear in the language of their choice. For us, we have shareholders who both speak English and French. We have employees who speak French, others who speak English. I have to say that the majority of our audience are more comfortable in English. For us, the choice of holding this general assembly, particularly when it's held virtually, can affect more people, if it's held in English. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Questions from shareholders.
Thank you all for your attendance today, and I appreciate the questions coming from the MÉDAC and the proposals and the open nature of the discussions we had with all shareholders. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank our board of directors for their exceptional work and valuable advice. I look forward to working towards the achievement of our company goals in fiscal 2022. Finally, I would like to note that the many achievements of our company can be explained by various factors, the most important being our employees. Our dedicated teams come together to move our business forward. It is the employees around the world who forged the dairy multinational that we are today, and I would like to thank them again for their remarkable efforts throughout a particularly difficult year.
I would also like to thank our customers, our suppliers, our business partners, and our shareholders once again for their loyalty and trust. As there are no more items on the agenda, I now declare the meeting concluded. Thank you, everyone, and have a great day.