Pilgrim’s UK has announced the proposed closure of its Bury St Edmunds and Coalville sites, as it continues to implement a business recovery plan across its UK operations.
In a statement, the processor said that, over the last 18-months, the UK pig sector has faced “the most challenging time in its history” due to a combination of significant increases in production costs, falling pig prices across Europe and the UK, a decline in demand, labour shortages and the restrictions on the ability to export from some sites into key overseas markets.
Pilgrim’s UK recorded a loss of £16 million for the year to 26th December 2021, according to its latest annual report. The company said that its performance had been impacted by many of the wider industry challenges.
It added: “Throughout 2022, the business has continued to work with customers and suppliers to address these challenges through a wide range of initiatives to mitigate against rising costs and increase efficiency. However, a key part of its business recovery plan includes ensuring that its operational footprint across the UK is fully optimised.
“As part of this process, it has been identified that some sites are significantly under-utilised in terms of operational capability and capacity. This is due to a number of both legacy and ongoing factors, such as lower demand across the market, post-pandemic recovery challenges within certain markets and reductions in volume and business at individual sites.”
Proposed changes
According to the proposed changes, existing operations at Bury St Edmunds and Coalville will transfer to alternative Pilgrim’s UK sites at Corsham, Kings Lynn, Linton and Andover. A shift to a four-day week at its Ashton Plant has also been proposed.
These proposals will place around 290 employees at Bury St Edmunds, 350 employees at Coalville and 35 employees at Ashton at risk of redundancy. The business will enter into collective consultation with all impacted employees over the coming days, following the election of employee representatives.
During the consultation process, the company has confirmed that employees will have the opportunity to explore the options open to them, including applying to transfer to alternative sites within the Pilgrim’s UK network of manufacturing sites located throughout the UK.
Minimising the impact
Rachel Baldwin, vice president of HR for Pilgrim’s UK, said: “The decision to propose the closure of our Coalville and Bury St Edmunds sites and put a number of roles at risk at Ashton has not been taken lightly, but is unfortunately essential to help our business recover and secure a sustainable future for all of our team members across the UK.
“Clearly, this announcement will have major implications, not just for our sites, but the local communities surrounding them. We will do everything we can to minimise the impact of these proposals and work closely with local authorities and agencies to support our team members through what we know will be an extremely difficult period.”
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.
