The European Commission (EC) has approved the creation of a joint venture by Cargill and Faccenda, which will combine Cargill’s fresh chicken business in the UK with Faccenda’s fresh chicken, turkey and duck business.
The commission has found that the remainder of the transaction would raise no competition concerns, as the companies’ market shares are “small in the relevant areas outside the UK”.
The transaction was examined under the simplified merger review procedure, while the commission granted last October a request to refer the assessment of the transaction's effects on competition in the UK to the UK competition authority.
Following the EC’s decision to refer the case to the UK, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced a ‘phase 1 investigation’ into the joint poultry venture in October, under Article 4(4) of the EC Merger Regulation.
The regulator said at the time it was considering whether “it is or may be the case that this transaction, if carried into effect, will result in the creation of a relevant merger situation under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act 2002 and, if so, whether the creation of that situation may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition within any market or markets in the United Kingdom for goods or services”.
This story was originally published on a previous version of the Meat Management website and so there may be some missing images and formatting issues.
