Sprache 
Wow what a last 12 months. Who would have thought it possible for us all to have experienced what we have, with lockdowns, face coverings, social distancing, little or no direct contact with loved ones or friends, a downturn in the market due to the pandemic, Brexit and the end of the transition period in December 2020, border restrictions and finally Avian Influenza outbreaks.
Like most of the poultry industry during the beginning of the pandemic, it had been about being able to operate with +5% absences, mainly from staff self-isolating, quickly putting into place social distancing in the workplace and educating all colleagues how to work and to keep safe at the same time.
Fortunately, for our industry, many of the practical measures such as facemask use, wearing protective clothing and frequent hand sanitising are standard practice due to the bio-security procedures already in place. Like many companies, our employees have dedication, commitment and years of experience. However, when most of the population were told to stay at home, being in the food industry, we were classed as essential workers and for our staff who have to continue operating on our sites, this was clearly a concerning time.
Managing a pedigree operation is a complex business and relies heavily on the research and development department (R&D) to ensure that what they do day-in day-out shows in the end result. We continue to improve our pedigree lines to make sure the breeds you purchase have the genetic potential to deliver the best performance in the market place and to give you the confidence every year that improvement is being seen and you are financially reaping these benefits.
During this pandemic, we did not cut back on any of our existing selection traits, R&D technologies or new genetic research to guarantee we are still providing the best genetics that you have become accustomed to receiving from us.
We have continued with our expansion program and are currently building another new pedigree-rearing farm.
The completion of the 10 farms in Aviagen® Turkeys Russia was finished in 2020 with the last farm placed in April 2020 and started producing eggs for sale in October 2020.
The hatchery expansion at Le Sayec, France was completed in July 2020. There was a delay of 12 weeks to complete, but under the circumstances, this was a great achievement.
The market has obviously taken a downturn since the pandemic started. Even though retail sales have increased, manufacturing and catering have seen a huge drop in sales due to all the lockdowns and with the hospitality industry and airline companies more or less being shut for many months.
We have tried to manage our customers’ orders and needs as best as we can. We delivered to all of our customers, even when the airlines cancelled flights or there had been major country lockdown, we have incurred extra costs to get our deliveries through, despite all of this we have been 100% successful in all of our deliveries for 2020.
Finally Brexit, a trade deal has been agreed with the EU and some sort of normality will return soon. We have spent many hours organising ourselves to ensure that all exports from the UK will continue, with minimal impact or disruption to yourselves.
Avian Influenza is nothing new to our industry, but we all know the consequences if bio-security is not stringent enough and followed in the correct manner. We all need to make sure the highest biosecurity standards are in place and followed in order to prevent these current outbreaks from getting out of control.
Looking to the near future and beyond. Aviagen Turkeys will continue to invest heavily in all of its businesses to ensure we are suppling the most superior product in the market place and will invest further to expand to meet customer requirements. We have the full backing of our shareholders and with their strategy we will continue to invest and to find new ways in improving our genetics even more year on year.
I do hope the next 12 months will be very different to the last 12 months we have all just experienced.
Clay Burrows
Managing Director