Thai Union Frozen Products’ 2012 report showed sales passing THB 100 billion (USD 3.3 billion, EUR 2.6 billion), an increase of 8 percent from the previous year.“Throughout last year, TUF had faced a host of challenges, namely a fire incident at one of its Thai shrimp processing plants, the high cost of raw materials and strengthening Thai baht, to name a few,” the company said in a release. “The firm nevertheless managed to increase its sales continuously.”
The problems meant that, despite the increase in sales, annual net profits dropped by 8 percent compared to last year, falling to THB 4.7 billion (USD 158 million, EUR 121.3 million).
Company president Thiraphong Chansiri said he believed these were temporary setbacks, however, and that 2013 will show improvement.
"In the first quarter of 2013, the operating performance should improve when the tuna business returns to normal,” Chansiri said. “Also, since the price of shrimp raw material surged in every market, namely Thailand, China, Vietnam and India, we did adjust selling prices to cope with the higher costs in response. We are still confident that our shrimp business should recover in the second half of the year.”
