TUBERS – ‘The Good, The Bad & The Ugly’
Nov 5 2020
TUBERS – ‘The Good, The Bad & The Ugly’

The potato was first domesticated in Peru and Bolivia between 8000 and 5000BC [1]. Andean farmers found they grew well in higher altitudes around the lakes of Titicaca where the ancestors of the Inca settled [2].

Rich in starch, potatoes contain higher vitamin C than oranges, more potassium than bananas, and more fibre than apples [3]. The Spanish introduced potatoes to Europe in the 15th century having realised the food security significance [1]. Almost a century later the governor of Bermuda sent plants to Virginia in the U.S. [4]. It would take another century and a half to become an established crop in the U.S. In the 19th century, potatoes became a staple food, mostly to immigrants from Ireland and Scotland.  During the Klondike gold rush, prospectors prized potatoes as much as the gold they extracted. Although vitamin C was yet to be discovered, the gold diggers knew potatoes contained vital nutrients that helped them to survive in the wild [5].

Western diets have literally been consumed by the potato and all its derivatives but we have forgotten the benefits of other South American/African tubers, namely yacón, sweet potato and yam. Popular in South America and Africa, these are still relatively uncommon SUPERFOODS that grow and adapt well to controlled environments.

Strengthening the Immune System to protect against disease – ‘The Good’

YACóN (Smallanthus sonchifolius)

Yacón is a relative of the sunflower and Jerusalem artichoke. It produces a large tuber with a sweet taste and texture like an apple or watermelon [6].  The edible tuber can weigh from a few hundred grams up to a kilogram. Yacón roots contain inulin, oligosccharides and fructooligosaccharides (FOS), indigestible polysaccharides that pass through the human digestive tract without being absorbed. Yacón has been used to make syrups suitable for diabetic patients, highly valued in Japan for antihyperglycemic properties [7]. However the percentage of FOS versus monomer type sugars can vary with variety, particularly post harvest (personal communications Beotanics Ltd). They showed that monomer sugars increased dramatically within 4 months of storage. Proper variety selection, growing culture, storage temperature and processing are essential to maximise this vegetables unique traits. They have a prebiotic effect, promoting  beneficial gut bacteria to improve gastric health [7]. Yacón leaves also display medicinal properties with protocatechuic, chlorogenic, caffeic, and ferulic acids, which help to lower cholesterol [8]. 

Beotanics Ltd  Yacon Flower

Growing Yacón – Protected Controlled Environment

Yacón products including flour, syrup, juice, concentrate, tea extracts, both fresh and organic are predominantly exported to U..S markets [9]. If you want to grow yacón,  space is a prime consideration as they can grow to over 2m in height. They produce small yellow flowers at the end of the growing season. Although yacón is not photoperiod sensitive, it still requires several months to establish and tubers tend to be late forming with most development happening 5 to 8 months after planting. Yacón does not do well in dry hot summers as it’s unsuitable for maximising high FOS in tubers. The hot climate also makes it susceptible to thrips and whitefly so there is a definite advantage to cooler coastal conditions such as the Pacific Northwest.

Photo Credit International Potato Center (CIP) Lima

SWEET POTATO (Ipomoea batatas)

Sweet potatoes are a member of the morning glory family. They are gathering popularity as a healthy alternative to the starchy potato. Sweet potatoes produce more edible energy per hectare per day than wheat, rice or cassava [10] and are a good source of carbohydrates, fiber, and micronutrients. The edible leaves and shoots contain vitamins A, C and B (Riboflavin) [11]. Orange sweet potato contains high levels of beta-carotene which is converted by the body to vitamin A. They offer a cost-effective, sustainable way to supplement diets with only 125g needed to provide a RDA of vitamin A [12]. 

Purple sweet potato contains 4-7 times higher levels of anthocyanins compared to other sweet potatoes [13]. There is a wide range of genetic variability which leads to some interesting opportunities in the intensity of beta-carotene and anthocyanin, making this crop suitable for future food ingredients and nutraceutical exploration in both leaf and root. Beotanics Ltd are at an advanced stage exploring commercial opportunities in protected and vertical farming possibilities with specially selected genetics for high value applications.

A search for sweet potatoes in the U.S. will take you to California Sweetpotates, family owned farms in Merced, Stanislaus and Kern County. These sweet farmers practise sustainable controlled fertilization and drip irrigation to produce bountiful harvests. They have one of the best sites for learning how to cook with sweet potatoes. So why not make some amazing healthy dishes, we love the grilled sweetpotato tacos with queso fresco and cucumber-tomato salad.

Image courtesy of California Sweetpotatoes

YAM  (Dioscorea)

Some people confuse sweet potato with yam but it bears no relation to yam which are sometimes called true yams so as to make the genus clear.

Yam is a tuber of the Dioscoreacea family, commonly grown throughout African countries predominantly grown for starch. The most common cultivars include white yam (D. rotundata), water yam (D. alata), yellow yam (D.cayenensis), aerial yam (D.bulbifera), Chinese yam (image inset) (D.esculenta) and trifoliate yam (D.dumentorum) [14]. Bulbifera also known as ‘air potato’ is a highly invasive species [15]. The USDA has a citizen science programme to monitor Bulbifera vines and the biological beetles introduced to control their spread in Florida [16]. One of the most under-rated medicinal varieties is the water yam, cultivated in Nigeria for its large roots and edible white and purple flesh [17]. 

Medicinal Properties Water of Yam

Water Yam is a natural source of vitamin C, beta carotene and vitamin B6 with important cardiovascular protectant properties [18]. Traditionally hard to grow, water yam has been difficult to commercialise in comparison to other cultivars. Farmers in Nigeria have concentrated on the more lucrative white yam and mixed crop farming of maize, cassava, cocoyam and sweet potato to ensure food security and protect against crop failure. But water yam is very high in total dietary fiber and has a high amylase content [19], which helps to break down starch. Water yam is also low in sodium and high in potassium, manganese and calcium which has implications in food fortification supporting bone health, metabolism and heart function [20].

Yam has been shown to contain powerful antioxidants with anticancer properties. It has preventative effects against many other ailments including arthritis and gastrointestinal disorders [20]. In turn these antioxidants display anti-inflammatory effects which help control diabetes and obesity as well as related heart disease [20]. A study examining people that ate yam extract for 12 weeks showed improvements in brain function. The effect is thought to be due to diosgenin which promotes neuronal growth [21].  

Circulatory levels of two estrogen hormones, estrone and estradiol typically decrease during menopause, but both hormones can be increased through daily consumption of yam which has been demonstrated to increase levels by more than a quarter [22]. 

Why Yacon, Sweet Potato and Yam need to start clean – ‘The Bad’

Despite being relatively easy to grow, potato tubers have a bad past history and are susceptible to more than 75 diseases [22]. The origins of some of the more serious diseases including blight have since been traced back to Mexico [24]. Early potato blight most often seen in North America is caused by the fungal disease of Alternaria [25], but it is late potato blight caused by Phytophthora infestans that resulted in the devastating mid 18th century European and Irish famines [24]. This also affects other members of the solanacea family including tomatoes. Around the world potato blight causes around $6 billion of damage to crops each year [26].

There needs to be a clear path for viral and fungal free starting material and that starts with plant tissue culture and clean potato seeds.

Image Courtesy of Beotanics Ltd Yacon Tissue Culture

The solution is to source the best plants for the field from plant micropropagation that guarantees the plants are free from diseases. The International Potato Centre, CIP in Lima is the central genebank for all things potato related in the world, preserving every known tuber germplasm for future biodiversity. We don’t know of many commercial growers of yacón and sweet potato using protective environments but one Irish company, Beotanics in Kilkenny, Ireland are proving it can be done. They hold a wide range of virus free stock  in their laboratories to support over 1000 ha of client crops.

Protected cropping is essential for seed root production planting materials due to sweet potato being very prone to virus. In more temperate regions protected cropping of planting stock is essential as it’s a slip raised crop and huge amounts are needed for a very short planting window. 

Sweet potatoes can be grown using a dripper system which may circumvent contaminated fields allowing time for regeneration of agricultural fields. In Nigeria Professor Morufat Balogun oversees the work done by the Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) on yam seed production from meristem tip culture followed by aeroponic growing in tanks within polytunnels before finally planting out in the field. Commercial crops are subsequently harvested after 5 months with tubers as large as 5Kg. Funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hear first hand from Professor Balogun on the impressive work being done in Nigeria in the film below.

Potato Piracy – ‘The Ugly’ 

If you are planning to grow any of these crops, be aware that some have protected status. Cultivar piracy is a real threat to the South American economy who are reliant on the income from native crops.

Feeding future world populations

The potato tuber is the third most eaten crop in the world, but who would have thought the potato could sustain life beyond earth in years to come? Proof of concept experiments are currently taking place to grow potatoes in simulated Martian conditions [27]. So the humble spud is indeed a SUPERFOOD that has survived famines, disasters, maybe even become a sustainable food source for settlers on Mars but for now and more importantly could boost personal immunity to fight disease.

CIP, Lima – Controlled Environment Agriculture potatoes growing in Mars-like conditions
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The making of...
Nov 5 2020
The making of…

Transcript | Humanitarianism: The making of…

Jeremy Konyndyk: The humanitarian system we know today was not really designed to be a system. In fact, it wasn’t designed at all. It evolved from a ragtag community of small aid initiatives into what is now a $25 billion industry. The major institutions that we know and love today didn’t set out to become these billion dollar enterprises.

Heba Aly: And so how we ended up with the humanitarian response model that we now have really has everything to do with its origins. Many people feel that the current structures the world uses to deliver aid aren’t fit for purpose. But to understand why, you really have to go back to those early days.

Konyndyk: Recording from Geneva and Washington, this is Rethinking Humanitarianism, a 10-part podcast series co-hosted by The New Humanitarian and the Center for Global Development. I’m Jeremy Konyndyk, senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development.

Aly: And I’m Heba Aly, director of The New Humanitarian. We are your co-hosts for this series, where we are rethinking the future of humanitarian assistance at a time of potential transformation.

Konyndyk: In our first episode, we explored with Danny Sriskandarajah, the CEO of Oxfam, Great Britain, some of the problems that the sector faces today – the ethical, financial, and operational limitations that we are increasingly reaching. In this episode, we’re going to be looking back at how we got to this point.

Aly: But before we dive in, we’re gonna hear some reactions from a few of our listeners to episode one. Per Heggenes, CEO of IKEA Foundation, found the discussion about how needs are changing from aid delivery to social justice to be quite interesting. But his question is, if we would need a different set of organisations to advance that latter mission of social justice. Jeremy, what do you make of that?

Konyndyk: Well, you know it’s interesting when a lot of the big international NGOs that dominate the sector now do have a pretty explicit social justice component to their mission, but it tends to be much smaller emphasis than their operational focus. So you know, most of the attention is paid to fundraising and programmes and all of that. On the UN side, you know, most of the UN organisations to0 they came out of what you could call a social justice mission, or you could call a social mandate, you know, UNHCR’s mandate is to protect refugees, much more so originally than to provide billions of dollars worth of programmes. So I don’t know if it’s a different set of organisations, but it’s certainly a kind of reorientation of focus amongst the organisations we have.

Aly: And probably a skillset that might be a bit more challenging. I remember speaking to the Assistant High Commissioner of the UN Refugee Agency, who said, you know, in this new era, where what UNHCR really needs to do is negotiate with governments for the rights and well-being of refugees. That’s not a space that they’re used to operating in. You know, they know how to hand out mattresses, but they don’t necessarily know how to convince right wing governments that they should prioritise the refugee agenda. So I think it does demand quite a shift, and one that humanitarians haven’t historically always been very comfortable with, under the veil of neutrality and impartiality.

Konyndyk: We also heard from Tara Nathan, Executive Vice President of MasterCard, who leads the company’s work on digital solutions for development. She wrote to say that the idea of international NGOs playing less of an operational role resonated with her. She asked: Can we embrace this model that seeks to create a streamlined operational entity that crowds in the private sector, in addition to traditional local and global NGOs, and execute based on that kind of core competency, efficiency, and sustainability, not on incumbency or sector mandate? So, you know, getting beyond just the traditional big INGOs and UN agencies, who are the biggest players now, and begin bringing in some of these new entrants who have been more prominent in the system in the last few years.

Aly: Yeah, and I’ve had conversations with Tara about this actually, and she’s always pretty frustrated that there are a lot of contexts in which humanitarian aid workers are doing things that others could do better, faster, cheaper, and would free up humanitarians to go to those places where only humanitarian agencies would operate. And I think that makes a lot of sense – that there are places in which the private sector could do the job better. I think that raises a whole bunch of questions about, again, humanitarian principles, but there hasn’t been nearly enough willingness to have that conversation.

Konyndyk: And I think there’s a big question she gets to there about the way the business model works now about the fact that most of the opportunity and most of the resources tend to flow to the big traditional organisations who are best positioned to receive it, and that that does create barriers to entry for non-traditional organisations. I think that holds very much with local NGOs. You can see that over and over. With the private sector, I’m a little more sceptical. I mean, I think, you know what MasterCard has been doing is great. But it stands out because it’s so unique and unusual. You know, we don’t see that many other private sector entities that are really trying to get into the space that the NGOs are in, or that are investing in becoming part of that space. I think if you had companies doing what MasterCard did on a wider scale, and tried to join clusters, and so on, that would be really interesting. But we’re not seeing that. So I don’t know, on the private sector side, is it that they’re being kept out? Or is it that they’re not, for the most part, trying that hard to get in?

Aly: And finally, Bill O’Keefe, Executive Vice President for Advocacy at Catholic Relief Services sent us this feedback.

Bill O’Keefe: Episode One focused on the role of intermediaries. But I think without adequately distinguishing between those who add value and those who don’t, change is not happening at the rate all of us would like. But many NGOs have made significant strides towards meeting their World Humanitarian Summit commitments and aspirations, and turning over responsibility, resources, and power to local groups. I hope foreign aid advocates will shift from the defensive mode that we’ve been in for years to boldly calling for more funding, and for changes in donor and UN policies and practices that impede the localisation agenda.

Konyndyk: Yeah, there’s no question that the biggest obstacles to localisation are on the donor side rather than on the international NGO side. And I do think there’s a lot more that donors could and should be doing to induce and to encourage their partners, their international partners, to partner more respectfully, and to kind of drive that conversation about the sort of intermediary layer we need. I think there’s also more that the international NGOs could be doing to chart the course for that, to lay out examples for that. There’s nothing that is preventing international NGOs from using partnership as their default mode and direct implementation only when necessary, but that’s still not what we see.

Aly: Thanks to everyone who sent in their thoughts, and we look forward to hearing your reactions to today’s discussion.

Konyndyk: So today, we’re asking, if the humanitarian system is a kind of flawed superhero. What is its origin story? Which problems was it originally set up to solve? And how different are those from the problems of today? How does some of the dysfunction that we see today reflect that history? And does that illuminate why efforts at reform have so often faltered in the past?

Aly: We’ve got a great lineup for you today. So I’m going to introduce first Antonio Donini, a research associate at the Graduate Institute for International and Development Studies in Geneva. And one of those people who has experienced and observed the ins and outs of the sector’s evolution for years, including at senior positions at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Hi, Antonio.

Antonio Donini: Great to be here.

Konyndyk: We’re also very lucky to be joined by World Food Prize Laureate and former head of the World Food Programme, Catherine Bertini, who led WFP through a period of profound transformation after its separation from the FAO. Welcome, Catherine.

Catherine Bertini: Thank you, Jeremy. 

Aly: And finally, we’ve got with us, Jessica Alexander, a former aid worker and the editor of The New Humanitarian series on rethinking humanitarianism. She’s also the author of a memoir called Chasing Chaos: My Decade In and Out of Humanitarian Aid. Hi, Jessica. 

Jessica Alexander: Thanks for having me.

Konyndyk: So I’m really excited to have this line-up today, because I think we’ve got a group of people who have seen and experienced the humanitarian sector from a lot of different angles and perspectives, but also have the ability to go beyond just their own institutional experiences as they look at it, to think really critically about what is and isn’t working. Suddenly, we’re going to have a great discussion.

Aly: So before we dive into the topic of the day, we are going to ask you a question that we ask every guest on our show, as we try to rethink this sector. And that is, what is one weird quirk in the humanitarian sector that makes absolutely no sense to you? Antonio?

Antonio Donini: It’s the well-fed dead. It’s the fact that protection is always the orphan of humanitarian action. And that we’ve seen this from Sarajevo to Aleppo. We’re good at delivering stuff. But we’re not so good at protecting lives. 

Konyndyk: Catherine, how about you?

Bertini: It’s the abuse of young staff members by managers of all these big agencies not wanting to deal with a process that is transparent and allows for hiring and management of staff in normal ways. They have a system called consultancies. They leave people in difficult duty stations for years on end. They have no job security. They have no security against harassment or anything else.

Aly: Jess, what about you?

Alexander: Mine is, how is it with all of this money for the years that the sector has been around, all of this investment in professionalisation, that we still don’t have a way to reliably and accurately measure our effectiveness and our impact. I’ve been a monitoring and evaluation officer in a number of contexts and often the best we can do is report on outputs. So, how many tents we delivered, how much water we provided, how many trainings we’ve offered, without really any other metrics to demonstrate whether those were a good quality, the impact that they had for people, and what change they brought really meaningfully to people’s lives. I think in any other multi-billion dollar industry, I wonder whether that would be acceptable or enough?

Konyndyk: Those are three fantastic answers. It’s always fascinating to hear the range of answers you get to a question like that.

Aly: I was just gonna say, very different answers as well, which also kind of points to just how many problems there are to solve in the current humanitarian response system. So, how did we get here? Antonio, I want to turn to you, to kind of go back to the origins of modern day humanitarianism, which for many people was the famine in the Biafra region of Nigeria in the late 1960s. Take us back to that time, what humanitarianism looked like then, what it was trying to do back then.

Donini: Well, actually, I would disagree with that origin of organised humanitarianism. I think organised humanitarianism started in earnest after the end of the Second World War. That’s when we had the Geneva Conventions, the convention of refugees that gave structure to activities that had been going on for a long time. I mean, the humanitarian impulse exists in all cultures. We’ve seen states intervening in famine situations going back to China in the 1200s. You know, the Choctaw Indians sent $170 to the suffering Irish during the famine in the 1840s. The preservation of life has always been a concern that we see in all cultures.

What happened at the end of the Second World War, I think is important because that’s where the structures came into being. Some people would argue, me included, that the system hasn’t changed that much since the end of the Second World War. The basics are still the same. That’s the basics are in kind of northern Western oligopoly of donors of mainly Western – at least in origin, NGOs – and the UN system and the Red Cross movement kind of working together in different ways to address humanitarian need, where it shows up. The problems haven’t changed that much. It’s the plight of civilians in conflict, the plight of people suffering from so-called natural disasters, it’s displacement, it’s the protection of civilians, which is one of the areas where I think there hasn’t been much progress in the last 70 years.

So, what has changed, I think, is first of all the institutionalisation and proceduralisation and bureaucratisation of the system. But it’s also the size, it’s grown exponentially. By growing exponentially is gone through various teething problems first, and then growth crises. And we can pinpoint moments where there have been changes in the system, like Biafra, like Cambodia, like the establishment of OCHA, which was established after the outcome of the Iraq war. All sorts of things have been added to the system. But the basics, the fundamentals, haven’t changed.

Now, of course, that’s the dominant system. But there’s all sorts of other systems that, until recently, we hadn’t noticed. I mean, there’s a long history of non-Western humanitarian traditions, whether it’s in China or in Africa, or what the major religions have been doing for 4,000 years. So I think, what we have is a disconnect between the sort of universal aspirations of a system that was set up essentially by the West, and the reality that there are many types of humanitarianism out there. And that some, as we’re seeing more and more, are trying to fight to get a bigger place at the table, or who are splitting off and doing their own thing separately.

I think now there’s much more awareness that the foundations on which the humanitarian system is based are a bit shaky. The processes, institutions, and concepts, or narratives that we’ve developed since the Second World War are now in crisis because new centres of power are emerging. China, India, and even in Africa, where different traditions or different ways of looking at how to address the issue of assisting people who are in dire straits are emerging or are strengthening. So I think that’s one of the big challenges for the future, you know: How does our past equip us to deal with problems, not to mention COVID, and, you know, the survival of the species that are coming down the pike, that we will likely be very unable to address with the tools of the past.

Konyndyk: It’s a very Northern-dominated system traditionally, as you’re saying, you know, the traditions from other parts of the world have not factored as much into the structure. And you can kind of see that even in the make-up of who we have in the discussion today, and kind of where we all come from. But I want to go back to those early days that you’re talking about. And you know, Antonio, you’re saying the structure is, the crises haven’t necessarily changed – crises are crises in some ways – but the way we think about structures has. And so Catherine, on that point, when we go back to the origins of these agencies, UNHCR didn’t set out to be a multi-billion dollar agency, it set out to be a three-year programme to resettle refugees in Europe. The office that I used to run at USAID, which now is a multi-billion dollar office was a coordinator, a secretary, a desk, and a telephone when it was set up. I’ve heard you describe WFP’s origins as a surplus food disposal agency. Tell us a little bit about that history. And how did WFP start out? What was it set up to do?

Bertini: There were joint resolutions of the General Assembly and the FAO Council in 1961 to set up a department at FAO, to be supervised in the field by the UN, which meant UNDP, and in Rome by FAO, in order to take surplus commodities from wealthy countries and move them to people in need in other countries. George McGovern was then the head of Food for Peace in the Kennedy White House. And he and some brilliant academics from Europe put together this idea, and got it passed reasonably quickly. So they began operations in 1963. Moving food by ship from the US or from Europe or Japan, Australia, Canada, and then deciding what countries could best use that food. So it was development. It wasn’t emergencies. There weren’t that many at that time. And it was used to help with food for work programmes, with programmes for infant feeding, with some school programmes, with programmes to help develop dairy in some countries, and other kinds of small-scale farming.

So that’s that’s what it was for some time, then some countries started donating more than in-kind. And the in-kind was, you know, fish from Norway, cheese from Denmark, meat from Germany, grains from North America and Australia. And over time, as more needs arose and as some countries said, well we can’t get food, they started giving cash. And then eventually, certainly, by the mid 1900s, there was no such thing as surplus, it was all contributions, either in-kind or cash. In the 80s then, there started to be some more crises that WFP was asked to respond to. There were a couple before then, but they grew and grew in the 80s, and especially after the end of the Cold War. Then, WFP was asked much more to be involved in emergency operations. It had this one really, really good thing going for it. It was a very efficient transport operation globally. So it built on that to build a big logistics operation and communications operation, and was out front on technological changes and improvements in the system. And those things helped grow WFP exponentially.

Konyndyk: So it was really set up with a very different focus and a very different set of tools than what it uses now. I’m fascinated by this idea that, you know, you might have American grain and Norwegian salmon in the original WFP food baskets. I’m probably overstating that, but…

Bertini: We did! For a while those high price commodities were actually good for things like exchange for weapons after a ceasefire, for instance. You know, good old wheat or corn wasn’t going to do it, but maybe some nice cans of meat or fish or cheese would make a difference. But it’s actually the Nordics who decided that that wasn’t the best use of funds because the amount of food that could be purchased with cash would be a lot larger than what could be donated, given the kind of products that they donate. And that, plus an interest that a lot of European donors had that the Americans were sending food but not sending cash to cover the overhead pushed the system further.

Konyndyk: Some of that transition, then, that evolution in the mission, was driven by the donors.

Bertini: Yes, it absolutely was especially about using the most cost effective commodity that could reach the most people. That was the first round, a later round was there should just be more cash. And now there’s certainly primarily cash, but used for a lot of different things, not just purchasing of food by the organisation.

Aly: Jess, while we’re kind of thinking about what the system quote unquote, and I think many people have said it’s not a system, looked like in those early days, this year is The New Humanitarian’s 25th anniversary and you have done this deep dive into 25 years of data to look at how the sector has changed in that last quarter century. What was your main takeaway from looking at that data across a whole bunch of different kind of vantage points?

Alexander: Well, there were a number of takeaways. And I think the intention with that piece was to try to find numbers to put on some of the narratives that we tell ourselves in the sector. So, you know, there are more people in need today. Well, what do the numbers actually show? There are more people who are living in urban centres versus in camps? Well, what actually do the numbers reveal about that narrative? And some of those narratives, when we actually tried to find them in the data, we couldn’t find data or information that backed up those narratives. So it’s these kind of tropes that we tell ourselves about the growing needs, or how the place of aid has changed that we either don’t have accurate or reliable data to back up, or we may be stretching those narratives. 

But I think what the data showed us, and what I think is the most obvious thing, and what both Catherine and Antonio have touched upon is this massive expansion over the last 25 years. Just financially, we’ve gone from around $2 billion in 2000 to over $24 billion today. And that’s just figures from OCHA’s financial tracking service, there’s other figures that show even larger growth. But the bottom line is that the sector is roughly grown, you know, at least 12 times from, you know, 20 years ago. And I think what that means is there’s obviously more of us running around, there are more people and positions in the sector; there are more organisations who are trying to solve these problems and address needs. 

But what it also shows is that we throw money at this sector, and we pump resources into it expecting that that will solve problems. And now it’s expanded to this point where it’s extremely big, it’s this multi-billion dollar industry, some would argue, and I think Antonio has said in the past that it’s too big. What I think is revealing, though, too, is what the data didn’t show is that sure we’re bigger, but does that necessarily mean that we’re better? We’ve changed but have we improved?

And I think another piece of that analysis was this overview of buzzwords over time. And I think that showed that you see this rise in different themes that gained traction and popularity within the lexicon of the sector. So things like gender, localisation, resilience, they become very popular, and then either they fade away or they kind of maintain as part of our discourse. And usually what we do is we kind of tack a position onto those themes. So we have a gender advisor, a resilience officer, an accountability specialist. You know, and we think that that will solve the problem, but it doesn’t really do much to change some of the underlying issues that are at the root of some of these problems.

And this expansion I also want to just say has, inadvertently I think, pushed us away from some of the origins, I mean, away from some of the people that we were meant to serve: The bureaucratisation makes it harder for them to enter our system, if that’s what we’re calling it. And it’s almost so big and bureaucratised now that it prevents us from undoing some of those things that hold us back. So it’s making us less nimble and less able to adapt to today’s challenges, and ultimately perhaps making us less relevant today.

Konyndyk: I think that’s really interesting. And particularly this observation about the evolution of buzzwords and how we then attach positions to buzzwords and that things will change. When you think about the relief to development continuum, or spectrum, or resilience, or linking relief for reconstruction and development, I mean, that sort of concept, every five years, there’s a new buzzword, and yet, we haven’t really changed that much about it over the years. And that’s what I think makes some of the aspects of WFP’s history really interesting, because, you know, so many efforts to change the system over the years haven’t really touched structure. They haven’t really touched money. They’ve been buzzwords, they’ve been guidance, they’ve been hiring a new officer with a new title. But yeah, the experience with WFP, and you know a lot of this now is 30 years old, so it’s not to say that WFP is perfectly up to date today. But I think it’s an interesting case, WFP’s separation from FAO, as its mission changed, and one of the rare examples in the system of an agency’s mission getting out of step with what it was being called to do. So Catherine, tell us a little bit about what went into that, you know, what was the impetus for pulling out WFP and making these huge structural changes?

Bertini: As WFP started growing, I think there was a little bit of jealousy on the part of the parent, FAO. And also, later, as emergencies started growing and money was following emergencies, FAO and many other agencies, UNDP being one of them, ultimately said, ‘oh, we have to get in this business too, because that’s where the money is’. So there was more interest in hanging on to WFP. Nobody ever wants to give up part of their bureaucracy, anyway.

But Jim Ingram, who was my predecessor, who was for 10 years the executive director of WFP, an Australian person from their foreign service, he pushed for his whole 10 years in office to try to separate WFP from FAO. So, it took a long time. And of course, that was a governance issue. I mean, he had to ultimately convince governments to vote both in the FAO governance process and in the UN governance processes: WFP was set up jointly by the two entities. They had to both vote to allow WFP to separate. So, since 1992, WFP became an agency more like UNICEF or UNFPA, where it was more independent, but it’s still a funder programme of the UN. The difference is, it’s still jointly governed. So, for instance, the head of WFP is jointly appointed by the secretary-general, and the director-General of FAO. And there’s a few other things like that, but it is separate.

Why did it have to be separate? FAO is a bureaucracy like WHO is a bureaucracy and UNESCO’s a bureaucracy, And that operates on normative schedules. And they couldn’t react to fast-moving emergency operations. So WFP had to be separate because before they couldn’t make their own personnel decisions, their own finance decisions, budget decisions, and even decisions about where to go and what to do, and the bureaucracy around FAO didn’t understand it, and took too long to deal with it. So, it was just not going to be possible, again with the changes coming in the late 80s and the 90s. And this change officially took place at the end of 1991.

So, I came into that job in April of 1992, with a whole new set of operating systems that I could create. So, we had a chance to start from my day one to totally change the way we looked at WFP.  And that’s, I think, one reason why we were successful in significant reforms of WFP, starting in 1992, based on the work that was done at FAO.

Konyndyk: And how would you describe what that enabled WFP to do differently. So there’s a fascinating component to this which is just the politics of how you do that, and I want to touch on that in a little while. But in terms of the impact of this, in terms of what WFP was able to do better or differently than what it could do under FAO, you know, why was it important from an outcome perspective to invest the blood, sweat, and tears that Jim Ingram did in separating WFP out?

Bertini: We had to be able to essentially, as any organisation would, establish its own mission, establish the way it was going to meet the mission, deal with our governing body, not a big larger governing body made up of all governments to try to do those kinds of things, and then, ultimately, as I said, recreate every system within the organisation. So it couldn’t have been possible in a bigger bureaucracy of governance, but it could be possible in a small one. That’s why all the UN agencies that handle humanitarian work have small, well, if 36 is small, small governance structures compared to at least the General Assembly, and why the organisations are voluntarily funded, which is another key point in terms of what we had to do.

We felt we had to prove to our donors who were all voluntary that giving funds to WFP, or food at the time, was worth that decision on their part because we were going to produce. If I can add one other thing back to what Jessica was saying, I asked at WFP a few years ago: Why is it that if you compare 2002, which is when I left, to 2016, we’re working in the same amount of countries and serving the same amount of people, but your budget is three or four times what it was at the time. So what’s the difference? The answers were, well, the food is better, because it’s more nutritious food that we look for and provide. Many of the people that we serve are in need for longer periods of time, like Syria or Yemen, where the situation is going on longer, therefore, over time, it’s more expensive. The transport is more expensive. The security is outrageously higher than it was before.

Aly: A good investigative project for us to look into, whether all that new money has actually resulted in better aid. I want to turn to Antonio because I guess the example we’re trying to explore with the example of WFP is: The world is changing around us, and to what extent are the mechanisms and the architectures that the world depends on to deliver aid also changing to adapt to that changing world? So, you know, Catherine, you just gave this example of how WFP had to evolve to kind of meet the changing times. And I suppose the question is kind of how often that really happens. And Antonio you said, crises haven’t really changed, I would dispute that. I think we have a very different landscape today than we did when the modern international humanitarian architecture began, which is that crises are lasting much, much longer, they’re much more complex, they’re at a bigger scale. And as you yourself have written, they are now increasingly transnational problems that can’t necessarily be solved by multilateral institutions. So I just wonder how you see that kind of bigger picture of a changing world, and the degree to which the institutions that were set up in a very different world have been able to keep up?

Donini: You’re right about the transnationality of the crisis we’re now facing, and maybe that’s the significant difference of the past 10 to 15 years that is affecting humanitarian action. What’s clearly happening is that the multilateral system, being a collection of states, is no longer able to address transnational problems that are larger than the capacity of even the most powerful states to address. I think one other change that hasn’t been mentioned so much is that, yes, the system has grown exponentially. But with the growth, the transaction costs, and the cost of the superstructure of the system, have also grown. And I think they’ve grown faster, in proportion. The extent of traffic, of email traffic between headquarters and the field has just grown exponentially. I remember when I started in this system, you know, you didn’t have all that. When you were the head of a sub-office in the country, you were basically on your own, and even your relationship with the country office was sometimes very distant. So, we now have quality and accountability initiatives, which are important, I agree. We have all sorts of institutions that have grown around the system. All these superstructure elements have a justification in their own right. But the overall picture is one where, you know, some sociologists would say that the humanitarian system has changed from being a means to an end to becoming an end in itself.

Konyndyk: Yeah, I think, Antonio, your comment earlier about, there’s some continuity in the crises, but the structures with which we approach them and what we’re trying to do in them has really shifted. I think that’s interesting in light of what Catherine described about the difficulty that goes into actually changing these systems. And, you know, when you try to change that structure, it runs into a lot of politics and a lot of bureaucratic complexity. What do you see as why it’s so difficult? Why do we cling so much to the structures that we have, even as they become increasingly, or even as they become decreasingly, fit for purpose for what we’re trying to do in the crises of today?

Donini: Yeah, it’s a bit like the reform of the Security Council. It’s becoming more and more impossible to reform the Security Council. And I think that the vested interests in the humanitarian system are such that it’s also very difficult to make change. Now, you know, traditionally, historians have pointed out that major change in international institutions happens only after major wars. Fortunately, we haven’t had a third world war. And maybe COVID is, in a sense, one of these defining moments where there will be a before and after, but the odds against major reform in the humanitarian system are formidable, basically, because of the way in which it’s structured: Where’s the power in the system? Who controls the money? Who controls the narrative? And are the people who control the money and the narrative – that’s the major donors, the major Federation’s of NGOs, and to a large extent, the UN itself – are these sources of power and the network power that they create around them, are they amenable to letting go of some of this power? Is it possible to delink the humanitarian system from the power sources that set it up? You know, I think it’s American poet, Audre Lorde, who said that you can’t dismantle the master’s house using the master’s tools. Change will only come when there will be a sufficient counter-power that will challenge, and we’re seeing some of this today, you know, the way in which the debate on the decolonisation of the system, on sexual exploitation and abuse, it’s showing that there is a kind of counter-system that it’s voice is being heard a bit more than in the past. You know, is humanitarian action, the mechanism, the tool, the concept that is going to take us out of some of the crises that we are in. Maybe in the context of climate change and the survival of the species, we need a much more political way of looking at transformation, and including the transformation required to save and protect lives.

Aly: The fact that humanitarianism may not be the right tool, the fact that the problems today are transnational, and the tools we have are multilateral, the fact that power has been at the heart of a lot of the problems, I want to take that to you Jess, you did this piece for, for us at The New Humanitarian looking back on a lot of the turning points in the sector’s history, and all those efforts at changing and reforming. To what extent were those efforts, solving for the right problems, i.e,those problems we’ve just listed: power, structural design, etc.?

Alexander: Well, I think what everyone who I interviewed including, you Antonio pointed to is, you know, crises are moments of change, right. And it’s only after these crises, where flaws in aid’s delivery mechanisms or our approach are revealed, that we then flurry around to try to get our acts together to fix that problem. And so we’re always kind of reacting to a problem that has been identified or uncovered, or bad practice like we saw with recent sexual exploitation and abuse allegations – people are running around now to try to patch up that problem as opposed to a real organic look at the system itself and why it’s not working.

The fundamental premise on which aid was founded is still applicable, the desire to help humans in times of need, and to alleviate suffering. And those intentions and underpinning values were universally agreed upon, and still are relevant today. But it’s the means by which we go about them which I think have become objectionable, and I think have been revealed with today’s moment as being inappropriate for solving today’s problems. So these assumptions that rich gives to poor, rich knows what’s best for poor don’t necessarily hold true and have been sort of exposed in this current crisis and also with the Black Lives Matter movement.

And so past changes after each crisis have been more technocratic. They’ve tinkered at the margins, they’ve introduced the cluster system so that we’re better coordinated, they’ve introduced better leadership so that we have more accountable leadership, they’ve had, you know, these tweaks, but as someone I interviewed, you know, said, you know, we’re tinkering at the branches, we’re not addressing the structural roots. So I would say that, you know, it’s not that past changes haven’t been successful. In fact, many of them have been. I mean, we are better coordinated today. We are better professionalised today. We do have stronger leadership and greater accountability. I believe we do. It’s that we set out to try to address problems that aren’t the ones that I think need the most addressing.

Konyndyk: And what I think is really interesting, Jess, is your observation that we have been solving for some of the wrong problems, and we’ve been trying to use technocratic solutions, not fundamental solutions. Yeah, we have been kind of trimming the hedges, not replanting the trees. And so we, you know, we’re always stuck with the same basic power dynamics and slightly with slightly different window dressing.

Alexander: Yeah, and I think localisation is a key example of that. You know, we thought we could fix it by giving more money to local actors. Well, one, we haven’t, you know, that goal of 25% by 2020, well passed and not even close. But it doesn’t really mean anything, it’s meaningless, because it’s not really about the money. I mean, it’s about how we partner with organisations not as implementers, but as recognising them as innovators and groups who add significant value to operations. You know, they still have to implement programmes that we, as the international sector, dictate, not the other way around. That’s just one example. But until we kind of go about it in a more meaningful human way, trying to give money or these technocratic changes isn’t going to solve some of these more basic human dignity level issues.

Aly: So if we agree that, to date, efforts to improve the humanitarian system to make it more viable for the realities of this world have failed because they haven’t been addressing the right problems. What are, for each of you, your kind of million-dollar ideas for what would fix the humanitarian sector – the most kind of radical unimaginable thing that if you could wave your magic wand you’d put in place?

Konyndyk: Throw out politics, throw out the budget constraints? What would you do?

Aly: Antonio? 

Donini: I think a minimal thing would be some consolidation of the system. I mean, why do we have this salami-slicing machine where, if you’re outside a country, you’re coordinated by UNHCR, and if you’re inside the country, you’re coordinated by OCHA. Let’s merge IOM, UNHCR, and OCHA and have one major UN humanitarian agency. It will be economies of scale. Maybe you could throw in bits of UNICEF, some bits of WFP. This actually was an old idea that Jim Ingram came up with 20 years ago. That was one idea. His other idea was, let’s internationalise the ICRC. There was some logic there, you know. Let’s have a separate, non-UN organisation that’s in charge of, you know, doing things according to humanitarian principle. So I think that’s, you know, the salami-slicing of survivors of people who need assistance and protection into IDPs, ISPs, migrants, refugees, asylum seekers, etc.

Aly: What is an ISP?

Donini: International Stock Person.

Aly: I’ve never heard that one before.

Konyndyk: New to me.

Donini: We use it a lot. People who can’t move out of the country, like people in Aleppo, were ISPs. So you know, why do we have to have all these labels? I’m not saying we should throw out the Refugee Convention, but I’m saying that, you know, even by respecting the Refugee Convention, there’s no reason why we should have these turf battles.

Konyndyk: And I think what’s so notable about that is that those different categories, those different distinctions, don’t necessarily mean their needs are really fundamentally different. And that means we serve them in very different ways often. Jess, over to you what’s your, you know, if you had a magic wand with your million-dollar idea, or trillion-dollar idea?

Alexander: Imagine if every political leader, whether it’s a senator or a parliamentarian, a president, prime minister, before they start office, they have to sleep in refugee camp for up to a week, right – they have to sleep under the tents, they have to eat the food that’s provided, that we slap our labels on. It can be overseas, but it also can be, you know, a leader in Greece living in Moria camp, it can be a president in the US living on the US-Mexico border. But anyway, they need to, they need to really live there and experience what it’s like to be a vulnerable person. And I know that that may seem tokenistic just for a week, but I think it can do a lot to open people’s eyes to what that means. And similarly, for aid workers as a prerequisite for starting any job, they need to live with affected people for some time, and to stand in the lines under the sun waiting for a bag of rice, to sleep in the tents with holes that we give them, to make complaints that don’t get answered, and to just have a taste of what they experience.

Konyndyk: Catherine, how would you answer that question?

Bertini: Well, let’s start from the beginning of this discussion. What is the purpose? And I would take a blank slate and say, let’s define what our purpose is globally for humanitarianism, and then what that means in terms of people and where they are, where they might be, how they’re organised, and then what do we need in order to help them. And then I’d say, do we have anything here in our current system that answers any of those questions, or should we start over again? But that requires governments to make a really big commitment to, to really think through. But just cobbling around the edges of what exists now, just because it already exists, is the easy, timid way to try to handle it – it takes no fortitude. And that’s why it still continues.

Aly: Burn it all down, she says.

Konyndyk: Burn it all down and start from the ground. 

Bertini: I wouldn’t burn it down until we know what we want. We might want pieces of what exists, but I’d start with a clean slate.

Konyndyk: Well, this has been a fantastically rich discussion. And we were hugely appreciative to all three of you for your insights and for joining us today. It’s been really interesting to look at the history of this system and kind of how we got to this point. And, you know, as you said, Catherine, it’s kind of easy and maybe timid, but not necessarily all that effective approach if we’re just tinkering on the margins. And if we want to change, we’ve got to look at something more fundamental. So thanks so much to all of you for joining us today.

Konyndyk: Every episode, we’re going to include listener reactions to our previous shows. We’re really interested to hear your thoughts on what we’ve discussed today. Why do you think previous reform efforts haven’t delivered? How do you think the sector’s origins help to explain some of the current challenges? Tweet your comments or your questions to us @CGDev and @newhumanitarian, with the hashtag #rethinkinghumanitarianism, or send a voice recording to [email protected], and we’ll play some of them and respond in the next episode.

Aly: The rethinking humanitarianism series is hosted on The New Humanitarian’s podcast channel. To make sure you get all future episodes, search for “The New Humanitarian” via your favourite podcasting platform. And if you like what you hear, please do review and share it.

Konyndyk: To learn more you can head to www.thenewhumanitarian.org for a series of articles on rethinking humanitarianism, or check out www.cgdev.org for research by my team at the Center for Global Development on humanitarian reform.

Aly: Thank you for listening to Rethinking Humanitarianism. See you again soon.

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Kazakhstan To Tap Into Vast Potential In Developing Organic Agriculture
Nov 4 2020
Kazakhstan To Tap Into Vast Potential In Developing Organic Agriculture

NUR-SULTAN – Kazakhstan has ample opportunities to develop the country’s own organic agriculture, said Kazakh Minister of Agriculture Saparkhan Omarov at the Nov. 3 virtual meeting of the 32nd session of the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO’s) regional conference, the ministry’s press service reported.

Photo credit: inform.kz.

Kazakhstan will focus efforts on improving product quality, as well as will increase the production of agricultural products and food products, he said during the virtual meeting.

“We will continue to build up this competitive advantage and will actively use our beneficial geographical location at the crossroads of the most important trading markets of China, Europe, and Central Asia. If Kazakhstan uses the great potential of the agro-industrial complex, Kazakhstan will be able to become an international agri-food hub,” Omarov said in the session on sustainable food systems and healthy diets in Europe and Central Asia.

Kazakh Minister of Agriculture Saparkhan Omarov at the Nov. 3 virtual meeting of the 32nd session of the FAO’s regional conference. Photo credit: the Kazakh Ministry of Agriculture press service.

According to the European Commission’s data, Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest supplier of organic agri-food products to the EU. Kazakh organic wheat and flax oil are the absolute leaders in the global market’s sales.

Omarov stressed that the Kazakh government was able to ensure a stable food supply to domestic and foreign markets despite the pandemic.

“Over the eight months of this year, [Kazakhstan] sent food worth $1.3 billion to the SCO (the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) countries alone. In addition, more than 10,000 tons of flour were sent to the countries of Central Asia as humanitarian aid. It is worth noting that, according to the FAO, Kazakhstan fed more than 45 million inhabitants of the Earth last year with the export of wheat and flour,” he said.

According to the minister, Kazakhstan will develop sustainable food ecosystems to ensure regional food security. The National Distribution System will continue to increase production, expand storage capacity, as well as increase the export of agricultural products.

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Koninklijke DSM N.V. (RDSMY) Dimitri de Vreeze on Q3 2020 Results - Earnings Call Transcript
Nov 4 2020
Koninklijke DSM N.V. (RDSMY) Dimitri de Vreeze on Q3 2020 Results – Earnings Call Transcript

Koninklijke DSM N.V. (OTCQX:RDSMY) Q3 2020 Earnings Conference Call November 3, 2020 3:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Dave Huizing – Vice President of Investor Relations

Geraldine Matchett – Co Chief Executive Officer and Member of the Managing Board

Dimitri de Vreeze – Co Chief Executive Officer and Member of the Managing Board

Conference Call Participants

Mutlu Gundogan – ABN AMRO

Matthew Yates – Bank of America

Chetan Udeshi – JPMorgan

Andrew Stott – UBS

Thomas Wrigglesworth – Citi

Reg Watson – ING

Operator

Good morning. Welcome to DSM’s conference call on the first nine months results of 2020. [Operator Instructions] At this moment, I would like to hand the call over to Mr. Huizing. Please go ahead, sir.

Dave Huizing

Yes. Thank you, operator. Good morning, everybody, and welcome to our third quarter conference call for investors. I’m joined on this call by our co-CEOs, Geraldine Matchett and Dimitri de Vreeze. Geraldine will give a short introduction, after which we will open the line for questions for about 30 minutes.

As always, I need to caution you that today’s conference call may contain forward-looking statements. You can find the disclaimers about forward-looking statements published in the press release and on our website. And with that, I hand over to Geraldine.

Geraldine Matchett

Thank you, Dave, and good morning, everyone. Given the ongoing challenges caused by COVID-19 in our everyday lives, I do hope that this call finds you and your families in good health.

As you can imagine, COVID-19 remains a daily topic for us as well at DSM, and we continue to prioritize our employees’ and our partners’ safety. And thanks to your ongoing commitment and dedication, we’ve actually been able to maintain uninterrupted supply for our customers.

Now before I get started, I have to say that we are – that we’re very lucky and really looking forward to having your undivided attention for the next two days. We view this morning’s call on our nine months results as part one. And part two starts right after this call. You will be able to access the virtual conference center from 10 a.m., and you will find in this venue a lot of background materials on our Nutrition growth platforms and related innovation. We have lots of videos and infographics and interviews. As for part three, that will be tomorrow with the virtual investor event.

Therefore, conscious of your time, we will keep our introduction today a bit shorter than usual and we will try to keep the Q&A, which is focused really on the year-to-date results, to about 30 minutes, as Dave just said. Strategy and other such topics are probably better covered tomorrow.

Finally, with regards to these introduction comments, please note that following the recent announcement of the divestment of Resins & Functional Materials, we now publish our results on a continuing operations basis as from today, unless indicated otherwise. We already provided earlier some key restated data and the full restatement will be published with the integrated annual report 2020 with the full year results.

Now let’s start with the financial highlights on Page 3. Year-to-date, we have delivered solid results, given the circumstances, with Nutrition performing well including a slight positive effect from COVID-19, whilst our Materials business faced, of course, a more challenging environment.

As for Q3, more specifically, our businesses performed in line with our expectations with good conditions in Nutrition and an improving momentum in Materials despite the stronger negative foreign exchange effect. Nutrition delivered a 5% organic sales growth with a 6% increase in EBITDA during the nine months despite the increasingly negative effects. Q3 saw similar rates in organic growth and EBITDA growth with continuation of good conditions in Human Nutrition, solid conditions in Animal Nutrition and a gradual recovery in Personal Care.

Materials saw a 13% decline in volumes with the nine months – in the nine-month period and a 33% fall in EBITDA. In Q3, volumes were down only 6% compared to a fall of 25% in Q2 with an improved momentum in September moving into October. Although given the restocking effects and the recent surge in COVID-19 cases, we believe it is too early to get excited yet. As for the EBITDA, we saw a drop of 31% in Q3 for Materials compared to prior year, but this should be compared with the minus 59% in Q2, reflecting the improving situation.

Free cash flow was strong for the nine-month period, up 16%, driven mainly by lower working capital and reduced CapEx. All of this leads me to confirm our unchanged full year outlook for 2020. Given the business condition outlined as above for Nutrition, we feel comfortable in our expectation of delivering an at least mid-single-digit increase in adjusted EBITDA.

And with regards to Materials, while we saw a good recovery in September and into October, the recent surge in COVID-19 has reduced visibility, and therefore, we think it’s appropriate to continue to withhold an outlook at this time.

Now let’s look in more details at our Nutrition business, starting on Page 10. Overall, Nutrition delivered a good volume-driven organic sales growth for the nine-month period, up 5%. Volumes were initially driven by Animal Nutrition in the first quarter and then by Human Nutrition in the second and third quarters.

Adjusted EBITDA in the first nine months increased 6%, with a 3% negative foreign exchange effect offsetting the positive contribution from the CSK and Glycom acquisitions. The adjusted EBITDA margin was slightly up at 21.3% versus 20.9% last year. The third quarter was actually quite similar overall to H1 with a 4% organic sales growth and a 7% increase in adjusted EBITDA, highlighting the continued good momentum in the business.

Now let’s move to Page 11 for Animal Nutrition. In the first nine months, Animal Nutrition delivered a good 8% organic growth, driven equally by volume and by price/mix. COVID-19 stocking effects impacted volumes in Q1, as you will remember, as feed producers initially accelerated purchases in anticipation of supply disruptions. These stocks were gradually unwound during the rest of the year, resulting in a 1% volume decline in Q3. By the end of the third quarter, however, this destocking is largely complete and we have seen signs of improving customer sentiment.

In addition, the negative effects of the African swine fever that impacted our results last year continued to unwind in China, and DSM is well positioned to benefit from the resulting professionalization of pork production. Although this was still a minor contributor in Q3, we expect this effect to become more meaningful going into the next year. The strong pricing, up 7% in Q2, continued into Q3 with the pricing up 5%, still driven in part by higher prices of externally sourced ingredients and foreign exchange-related price increases in Brazil.

Now moving to Human Nutrition, let’s go to Page 12. In the first nine months, Human Nutrition & Health delivered a 4% organic growth with volumes up 8% and prices down 4%. Total sales were up 5%, supported by the recent Glycom acquisition, contributing 2%, but partly offset by negative foreign exchange effect of minus 1%. The strong performance in the second quarter continued into the third quarter with an 8% organic sales growth, driven by 11% increase in volumes. Total sales in the quarter saw a 3% contribution from Glycom, offset by a minus 6% foreign exchange impact.

Food and beverage performed well with a strong country loading effect from the end of Q1 and throughout Q2, followed by continued good demand in Q3. Demand for immune-boosting solutions has meanwhile remained elevated since the start of the COVID pandemic, supporting Dietary Supplements and Pharma sales in particular, whilst Early Life Nutrition sales were down on weak market conditions in China.

Finally, our other Nutrition businesses delivered a good financial performance during the nine months, and you can find all the details on Page 15. And this, despite lower sales in Personal Care, especially the sun filters, which were affected by COVID-19, although we have seen some signs of recovery during Q3 there, too.

Pricing for the nine months, minus 8% and minus 4%, owing mainly due to the lower vitamin C prices and lower contractual prices in Early Life Nutrition. Q3 saw a slight improvement with a minus 3% on price as the negative price effect from vitamin C is now almost faded out, while Early Life Nutrition had the same negative price effect as in previous quarters. Q3 also saw a negative mix effect.

Moving to Materials, let’s move to Page 15. Following a solid start to the year, Materials saw an abrupt deterioration in business conditions at the end of Q1 and into Q2 as customer operations were disrupted and end-user demand declined as a result of COVID-19. We moved quickly to implement cost control measures and followed in September with additional actions as part of a wider set of restructuring initiatives aimed at improving business performance and deliver annualized recurring cost savings of about €10 million to €15 million. This figure now excludes the amount previously attributable to the Resins & Functional Materials activities.

With reference to Q3, momentum began to improve from Q2 exit rate of about minus 15% to a run rate of about minus 10% in July and August, and a sharp recovery in volumes in September. This has continued into October with a good order book for November, driven by restocking effects and a more positive end-user demand.

However, the resurgence of COVID-19 across the world in recent weeks has, again, reduced near-term visibility. As we saw in March, trading can deteriorate rapidly with lockdowns reemerging. In Q3, volumes declined 6%, reflecting the gradual improvement in engineering materials as demand from global automotive improved during the quarter. And in addition, Personal Protection saw a recovery in the quarter as orders under the typical large government contracts, which were postponed from the end of Q1 and into Q2 slowly restarted in Q3.

EBITDA for the third quarter fell 31% compared to an EBITDA drop in Q2 of minus 59%. This reflects the negative operating leverage caused by lower volumes in high-margin specialties, which recorded a very strong performance in the same period last year. And with this, I would like to open the floor for some Q&A.

Question-and-Answer Session

Operator

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question is from Mr. Mutlu Gundogan of ABN AMRO. Go ahead. Your line is open.

Mutlu Gundogan

Yes. Good morning and thanks for taking my questions. I’ll keep it short, I’ll have two. The first question is on Human on the price/mix, what were the negative mix effects? That’s the first question.

And then secondly is also Human on Glycom. So the six-month sales seem to be 22% lower year-on-year. Can you explain why that is and what your short-term outlook for that business is? And to add to that, was this known to you when you bought the business back in February? Thanks.

Dimitri de Vreeze

Okay. Yes. No, let me take that question. So on H&H, the price/mix effect has to do obviously with the portfolio. If you look at H&H, we have four key segments that were, Early Life Nutrition, Pharma medical, Dietary Supplements and food and bev and obviously also throughout the region. And what we’ve seen with the good growth in Q3, with volume plus 11%, you will do see mix effects because the categories in one category has a different pricing than the other. So that’s what we meant with the mix effect. I think it’s important to know that we also, like Geraldine noted, that the vitamin C impact has faded out. So this is purely the mix effect, which you see on Human Nutrition.

Then perhaps on Glycom. I think, on Glycom, we reported €14 million sales for Q3 with an €8 million EBITDA. That was – prior quarter, it was €15 million sales and €6 million EBITDA. So it’s nicely in line. You see some fluctuations throughout the quarter. We strongly feel that we are on track, the Glycom integration has started. And basically, we’ll finish around quarter two 2021. What we see is that we get some positive response from the Early Life Nutrition customers, although COVID is sometimes slowing down development a little bit as this is a high added value ingredient, which obviously needs to be back into the formulations.

We also see some traction outside the ELN space in pet food and in H&H. So I think we are on track with Glycom, and it’s running according to expectations. I think the link we give as a guidance is about €9 million EBITDA third quarter going forward, but let’s see how 2021 evolves.

Mutlu Gundogan

All right, thank you.

Operator

Our next question is from Mr. Matthew Yates of Bank of America. Go ahead please.

Matthew Yates

Just a couple of questions, please. The first is around Materials. I guess once the Resins sale is complete, it will have shrunk the business by about 1/3 in revenue terms. Are you also able to reduce the overheads proportionately? Or are there any kind of stranded costs that would stay with you, given the smaller size of the overall business?

The second question is around Nutrition and the 150 basis points of year-on-year margin expansion. I was wondering if you could just disaggregate that a little bit for us in terms of how much is coming from accretive acquisitions, the mix changes you’ve highlighted. Really just to get an idea if you’re thinking 22% is a sustainable sort of run rate to be looking forward.

Geraldine Matchett

Thanks, Matthew, and welcome. Maybe let me start with the stranded costs and I’ll hand over to Dimitri for the 22% margin. So when it comes to the carve-out, of course, we are busy doing that. Now we have been, as you know, as a company, quite used to changing the portfolio and how to manage that properly. Now in the first instance, there will, of course, be a lot of SLA support provided that goes with the business. And that gives us plenty of time to then adjust any sort of scale consideration that we may have.

You also have to realize that at the exact same time, we’re also integrating and onboarding the Nutrition acquisition. So if you think of all of the global functions, for example, we need to look at the net-net of how that is looking. So no major concerns. And of course, the work is ongoing as we speak.

Dimitri de Vreeze

Yes. And then maybe for me on the Nutrition margin. As you have seen, normally, we track around the 21%. Year-to-date, it’s about 21%. Q3, obviously, with good Human Nutrition performance, you will see the balancing. So you will see Human Nutrition being stronger, which is helping a little bit the EBITDA quality overall. We also need to take into account that we need to look at what the other bits and pieces do, we normally forget Food Specialties, hydrocolloids and Personal Care & Aroma. But 22% is on the high side of the range.

We’ve always said that it’s between 20% and 22%. So I think the year-to-date gives a better picture with the normalization also of the Animal Nutrition space, where we saw a hike in quarter one, with a bit of normalization and destocking in Q2 and Q3. So I think the 22% is on the high side, but we don’t give you any guidance on the quality of the portfolio. We give guidance on the EBITDA growth year-on-year.

Matthew Yates

Thank you, Dimitri.

Operator

Next question is from Mr. Chetan Udeshi of JPMorgan. Go ahead please.

Chetan Udeshi

Just coming back to your point about the destocking ending at the end of – or almost ending at the end of third quarter. So are we now looking at fourth quarter run rate to be more normalized in terms of volumes in Animal Nutrition? And second question, just quickly on the Animal Nutrition price/mix. Can you maybe help us understand how much is the underlying price change if you strip out the FX element and the pass-through of ingredients.

Geraldine Matchett

Yes. Chetan, let me take those. So indeed, maybe actually let me start with the pricing element. So what we saw is the plus 5% in Q3 and it’s made up of the similar 3 elements that we saw at the end of Q2. So to give you a bit of a rough idea, we’ve got about 2% related to pass-through ingredients that we sourced ourselves for the premixes. We’ve got about 1%, which is sort of related to the Brazilian real, in particular, where you sort of get this FX that goes into the price because of the reporting currency.

And then that leaves about 2%, which is linked to our own ingredients. So this is something, going forward, it’s very difficult to anticipate the pass-through and the FX, but you saw 1%, 2% in terms of our own ingredients is something that we find relatively normal in that sense. Now when it comes to the destocking, you’re absolutely right. So we saw that huge stocking effect in Q1 then the unwind in Q2 and Q3, which results in this minus 1% for Q3. And if I talk a bit to the business conditions in Animal Nutrition, what we’re seeing is a continued good condition in Western Europe, particularly with a lot of food coming out of the retail outlets and a lot of strong demand for those easy-to-prepare proteins, which are basically chicken and egg in Europe and in Western countries, generally. So that is strong.

What we are seeing a little bit of weakness potentially coming through is in the less affluent economies, and particularly in APAC, where with the household incomes being impacted by COVID, we are seeing potentially a bit less consumption coming into this. And of course, we need to watch out because with the second wave in Europe, at least, the second wave, but the continued issues around the world with COVID, we’re also seeing that the eating out-of-home categories are still a bit on the back foot. And here, you should think about beef and aqua being the categories that are not helped currently.

Having said that, I did also mention in my opening comments that the African swine fever dynamics are progressing very nicely. Now if you remember, this started really impacting our results as of H2 last year, and we are seeing a good progress in China in terms of rebuilding of the swineherd. And while for now the positive effect year-to-date is relatively small, we do think that this is a little bit the turning points and that should continue to be a nice supporting thing for us, particularly as it becomes more professionalized, which helps us address the market even better. And we are, I have to say, helped by the fact that Brazil is actually a strong exporter of beef right now because of the devaluation of the real. So that’s the flip side of the currency, and that is also helping. So a bit of a long answer to say that, broadly, we should be, given this backdrop, seeing a more normalized development for Animal Nutrition going forward.

Operator

Following question is from Mr. Andrew Stott of UBS.

Andrew Stott

Yes. Just a question on strategy. So I’m hoping I’m not going to misquote you, but I’m reading from Bloomberg. DSM has remaining Materials in its Fit sustainability focus and doesn’t imply an immediate Materials exit. I’m more interested in the former because I thought the Resins business was pretty much along with sustainability lines with waterborne, and of course, Niaga’s gone in that transaction. So why Engineering Plastics and Dyneema, why are they more sustainable for you? Why do they fit better than the business you’re selling?

Dimitri de Vreeze

Yes. Thank you, Andrew, and you need to be careful quoting from Bloomberg.

Andrew Stott

I did say. I said assuming it’s accurate.

Dimitri de Vreeze

Nevertheless, I think the question is a fair one. So let me, first of all, say that I think our Materials businesses overall are looking for sustainable living and sustainable trends. And it’s not that Resins is more sustainable than other business elements we have. So that is basically not the guiding principle. The guiding principle was that we’ve looked at Resins & Functional Materials and we found that with Covestro, they will be able to grow faster. And this market is consolidating, scale is needed and we were not willing to be part of that game. And therefore, I think you also need to be strategically sound and say, listen, then we need to find a good home where that business could grow faster.

So that was the reasoning, not whether it was less sustainable or more sustainable in itself. And you will see that the remaining business, it’s still a business, which is €1.7 billion in size with a very high quality of the portfolio and EBITDA percentage of about 20%, which nicely fits into the company which we’re trying to build Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living and we’ll tell you more about that tomorrow. But that’s why we’ve decided for the divestment of DRF, not because it’s less or the other businesses are less sustainable. So I hope that gives a bit of context.

Andrew Stott

Yes. So bottom line, they are core assets or not?

Dimitri de Vreeze

Engineering Materials and Dyneema.

Andrew Stott

Yes.

Dimitri de Vreeze

Yes. Absolutely they’re part of our key to our strategy to build the Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living company. Obviously, we’ll look at these businesses as we’ve always done within DSM, but our strategy is the Nutrition, Health and Sustainable Living company. And the remaining businesses have very high-quality normalized EBITDA above 20%. So in that sense, good quality businesses comparable with the EBITDA percentage you see at Nutrition.

Operator

Next question is from Mr. Thomas Wrigglesworth of Citi.

Thomas Wrigglesworth

First one, just kind of following on. Obviously, M&A activity, both acquiring and selling assets, has accelerated. Should we read something in that, in the ability to execute M&A? Is this – or is this a bit like London buses, they’ve all – just three have come along quite rapidly at once? And a second question is on the Early Life Nutrition volumes. I think you called those out as soft in China. China has been a bit choppy this year. Are we seeing – is there something structural in that market? Or can you identify the temporary factors that are driving slower volumes for us?

Geraldine Matchett

Yes. Thomas, and thanks…

Dimitri de Vreeze

Do you feel – do you want to do the buses, Geraldine?

A – Geraldine Matchett

I will do the buses. Having lived in London since we are talking, I can fully relate to that phenomena. And it’s actually a really nice way of putting it a little bit about our acquisitions as well. Now as you remember, when we announced our strategy, we said that after three years, where we deliberately put M&A on hold while we were getting ourselves stronger, we reopened the door to M&A, predominantly in Nutrition & Health, but that we were not in a hurry, and the strategy is predominantly an organic strategy.

Now when the opportunities do come along, though, we have to take them. And if I look at the dynamics, of course, over the last nine months, we’re very pleased to have been able to make those three acquisitions that fit very well into our Nutrition strategy. And I would even say that in an ideal world, would we have necessarily wanted to do Erber in the middle of the COVID crisis? Maybe not, for integration and other reasons. But when the bus comes along, you have to take that opportunity. So I would say that’s a good way of describing it. And Dimitri, do you want to take Early Life?

Dimitri de Vreeze

Yes, Early Life. Indeed, we are tracking lower and seeing lower birth rates. We’re tracking birth rates just to monitor how business is doing, especially in China, indeed. And China is about 1/3 of the Early Life Nutrition market. So we do see that happening, and that creates some pressure on the market. Also, Chinese producers, helped a little bit by local stimulus, are taking a bit of share. But what we all see is that if markets are a little bit under pressure, we do see that new developments, where it’s been looked at creating value, more than creating volume growth, we do see a very solid demand on the ingredients where we play in with ARA, DHA, HMOs now coming in. So we do see that value chain popping up.

Yes, I think it’s too early to say how this structurally will spell out. But the fundamentals of that business are still very strong. I think if you talk about infant nutrition, we talk about baby food. I think nobody wants to take any risk. And reliability, credibility is absolutely key. So in that sense, we are absolutely well positioned. So it’s too early to say how COVID and how the lower birth rates are spelling out. We also had a discussion just this morning where people were saying, well, Dimitri, I’m expecting a huge increase in quarter 1 for the Early Life Nutrition business because it’s nine months after COVID lockdown, March, April. Yes, I mean we need to see – I think I have a preference on the impact that I think that’s more speculation than anything else. So we will give you more insight on that in quarter 1. But overall, I think the fundamentals are still strong.

Operator

Our next question is from Mr. Reg Watson of ING.

Reg Watson

This question is – will be probably best directed at Geraldine. We’ve seen a number of companies reporting stronger EBITDA margins because they’ve been able to avoid costs such as travel. And with an organization as large as DSM and with your global reach, are you seeing any margin benefits from the COVID crisis in the way you’re now operating, particularly with work from home?

Geraldine Matchett

Yes. Thanks for the question. Now of course, in the mix of all of this, we’ve been watching our costs as well. Now when you have this kind of drop-off, particularly in our Materials businesses, then you need to take all the actions possible. And travel is one of the cost categories where currently we’re lower. And going forward, actually, the big discussion is what will be the new normal because that’s what we call it internally. So are we going to go back to as much travel as we used to do? Or is it going to be somewhere in the middle? And currently, we’re thinking somewhere in the middle. But to be honest, it’s all bundled into all sorts of cost measures that we were taking to make sure that we weather the storm in a good way. And it translates into this good cash performance, right, of 16% up versus last year.

Reg Watson

Okay. So your expectation going forward as we come out of the crisis is that you’ll be able to hang on to some of this, but not necessarily all of it? Is that my sort of…

Geraldine Matchett

Yes. Exactly. Exactly. I mean – and in the meantime, of course, we’ve also done a few more programs, right? So we have a number of – we’ve been trying to keep our organization as effective and as efficient as possible. So that will also be bearing fruit going forward. So for example, in the Materials cluster, we – as I mentioned in our opening comments, we’ve continued to adjust organization and that should bring some annualized savings. So if you put that all in the mix, I think we’re in a good place.

Operator

We have a question from Mr. Gunther Zechmann of Alliance Bernstein. My colleague is going to open his line. Mr. Zechmann, can you say something? Is your line open? [Operator Instructions]

Dave Huizing

Otherwise, operator, if we are the – if this is the end of the queue, give it a second. If that doesn’t work, then I think we are done with the Q&A session, and we can continue tomorrow happily. So then I would say let’s – yes, so this is the end of the queue? Yes. Okay. That brings us then to the end of the Q&A for today. Maybe, Dimitri, you can make some closing remarks before we close this call.

Dimitri de Vreeze

Yes. Thank you, Dave, indeed. So let me try to close. So DSM delivered a solid nine-month result in a highly dynamic environment. I think we’ve seen that every day with trading in Q3 developing in line with expectations we have communicated at Q2. Nutrition continues to do well with good condition in Human Nutrition and solid conditions in Animal Nutrition, together with an improving Personal Care.

And it confirms our long-term growth drivers. In Materials, we’ve seen improving momentum with a good order book in October, but recognized a limited new visibility caused by the recent resurgence of COVID-19. But let me say that I’m ever more convinced now about the quality of our Materials business, especially after the recent announcement of the divestment of our Resins & Functional Materials business. Now let me turn to our investor event. Like Geraldine said, we are excited to welcome you all tomorrow to our live virtual event. And given that this is the first time we’ve undertaken such a format, we have a sense of nervous anticipation. So we’re all ready. And we hope you will forgive us for any lapses, either technically or personally. But rest assured, we try to minimize them as much as we can.

From 2:00 Central European time, Geraldine and I will present our strategic progress, whilst our Nutrition and Innovation colleagues will present the key growth platforms and related innovation pipeline. And obviously, we will close with a Q&A session. However, you don’t have to wait until then. I really encourage you to visit our virtual conference venue. I’ve been there already. And it will be open for you today at 10:00 sharp, which showcases innovation-driven growth platforms in the Nutrition businesses. And you will find a variety of videos, interviews with business leaders, animation and more. I really think it’s worthwhile your time. And with that, back to you, Dave.

Dave Huizing

Thank you, Dimitri. So we are done with Part 1, as Geraldine called it, and that means we can conclude our today’s conference call. We’re looking forward to welcome you all to our virtual investor event. And as Dimitri said, it’s open as from 10:00, so please go there. If you have any issues, questions or whatever getting in or you have other questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us. So thank you. And with that, I hand it back to the operator.

Operator

Thank you, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes DSM’s conference call on the first nine months results of 2020. Thank you for your attending. You may now disconnect your lines.

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Invisible fungi revealed by their genetic material
Nov 3 2020
Invisible fungi revealed by their genetic material
Credit: Uppsala University

How can new life forms that we cannot see be discovered? Using a novel method based on looking for DNA in soil samples, researchers at Uppsala University have revealed the existence of two hitherto unknown, but very common fungus species. They are thought to perform a key function in the ecosystem, but their exact role remains to be clarified. The study is published in the journal IMA Fungus.

To most people, the word ‘fungus’ conjures up something like a chanterelle or fly agaric, rising vertically from the ground. Since a huge number of fungi do not form distinct fruit bodies, however, they do not catch the eye. This applies, for example, to the newly discovered fungi. Invisible to the naked eye, they are nonetheless common in forest soils in Northern and Central Europe, as DNA analyses of soil samples show.

The researchers found the fungi in soil samples from the Ivantjärnheden field station near Jädraås, in the province of Gästrikland, in east central Sweden. The method developed by the scientists is based on extracting both long DNA sequences, to investigate species interrelationships, and short DNA sequences to get an idea of how common species are.

“Our data show that these two are closely related but distinct species that compete for resources in the soil profile. One wins out, and is dominant, in organic soil; we’ve named it Archaeorhizomyces victor. In second place we have Archaeorhizomyces secundus, which makes do with resources in mineral soil to a greater extent,” says Anna Rosling of the Department of Ecology and Genetics at Uppsala University, who headed the work.

Where the two species coexist—in soil and roots in mixed and coniferous forest—Archaeorhizomyces victor thus predominates in the humus-rich soil. Just a little further down in the ground, where the soil contains less nutrients, victor does poorly and secundus can become widespread.

These species belong to the class Archaeorhizomycetes and, as such, to a group of ancient fungal root endophytes: fungi that colonize plants’ root tissue internally and live in symbiosis with the host, enhancing plant performance and causing no obvious harm. From soil samples around the world, the researchers know that this class comprises at least 1,000 species. These fungi are common; in soil samples from Ivantjärnheden, for example, they make up roughly 30 percent of all sequenced genetic material. This large fungus group was first described scientifically in 2011 and then, too, it was Anna Rosling and her research group who made the discovery, and also succeeded in cultivating two species in their laboratory. The fungi then grew enough to permit more detailed study. Rosling describes them as slow-growing and somewhat beige in color, and says they form differently shaped spores.

With these two newly discovered fungi, the known species of Archaeorhizomycetes have doubled in number. Even more important, the researchers think, is the fact that they have established a method of identifying new species that does not depend on cultivation, or on finding a fruiting body. And much remains to be discovered in the fungus kingdom. The presence of certain marker genes in soil samples indicates that nearly 90 percent of all fungi have yet to be scientifically described.

“With our study, we want to give an idea of the tremendous diversity of fungi in the soil and the importance of naming them, even if we haven’t seen them with the naked eye yet,” Rosling says.

Explore further

Fungal species naturally suppresses cyst nematodes responsible for major sugar beet losses

More information:
Faheema Kalsoom Khan et al. Naming the untouchable – environmental sequences and niche partitioning as taxonomical evidence in fungi, IMA Fungus (2020). DOI: 10.1186/s43008-020-00045-9

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Uppsala University


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Invisible fungi revealed by their genetic material (2020, November 3)
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MUSEVENI: Uganda is ready for takeoff
Nov 2 2020
MUSEVENI: Uganda is ready for takeoff

FULL SPEECH

Countrymen and Country Women,

The NRM is presenting to you a Manifesto for the period of 2021-2026.  This Manifesto builds on the big successes of the NRM ever since 1965 when we formed a Student Movement, on the basis of new principles, having come out of the old Political Parties of DP, UPC and Kabakka Yekka, that were based on sectarianism of religion, tribe and gender chauvinism.

Over the years, this Student Movement, came to understand the long journey of 4½ million years of the human race, on this Earth, as well as Africa’s position in that long journey.

In the speech I gave to the Conference in Namboole on the 25th of January, 2020, I pointed out to the country how the human being, initially only living in Africa until about 100,000 years ago, used his unique characteristics of his big brain, a hand that can shape things by holding and working and his bi-pedalism (walking on two legs), to make tools (stone, hammer, chisel, etc.) and use those tools to do work for purposes of producing or catching food (hunting, fishing, agriculture) and improving his quality of life.  In that effort, he was assisted by the continuous discovery of new technologies that used the laws of nature to assist production (the invention of fire 1.5million years ago, iron in the year 1200 BC etc.).  These continuous discoveries changed the way of living of man and the way he was producing wealth and food or he was catching food (hunting, fishing).  The invention of fire enabled man to descend from the trees and live in caves; enabled people to cook (kuteeka), roast (kwootsya), kukara (dry on fire), kutarika (grilling, to smoke), kujumbika (earth-oven, cooking pit), rather than eating the food raw (kukoota, kumeketa); and, eventually, enabled man to get the hard metal of iron (ekyooma) out of the iron ore, a rock or soil, known as obutare.

This ability of man to discover new technologies, reached a watershed point (a revolutionary boundary point) in the year 1440, when a German man by the names of Johannes Gutenburg, invented a Printing Press.  Most of the previous tools were powered by human muscle.  However, the Printing Press used technology of a screw press.  In the year 1698, Thomas Savery, a person from England, invented the water pump that was being powered by condensing steam.  Eventually, by the year 1812-1813, the water pump technology, was developed into the steam-engine technology that, started pulling trains.  This change by part of the human race from the use of the muscle-power to machine power, came to be known as the Industrial Revolution – the first Industrial Revolution. The second Industrial Revolution was the invention of electricity and the third one was the automation of machines.  The human race, is now entering the 4th Industrial Revolution of Artificial Intelligence, machines that have got artificial brains.

This is great for the human race.  However, the problem is that Africa, the pioneer of civilization, the origin of the human race, had missed out on these water-shed phenomena.  Why?  Two reasons.  The first, the failure by our indigenous rulers to detect the new danger of Europeans that broke out of Western Europe, blocked by the Ottoman Turks that captured Constantinople (Istanbul) in the year 1453 AD, when they started looking for a Sea route to the East (Asia) to replace the Marco-Polo land route that had been blocked by the Turks.  These chiefs, failed to unite us to fight this new danger.  Instead, putting on leopard and lion skins, pretending to be those animals in courage, they were busy fighting one another.

Secondly, at the very moment new inventions were being made in Europe and China, Africa came under assault by these new arrivals, starting with the bombardment of Mombasa by Vasco Da Gama on the 7th of April 1498, on his way to India.  Indeed, the first slaves were taken from Sierra Leone in the year 1652.  By 1862, when the first European arrived in Uganda, Uganda was still a three class society of farmers (livestock and crops) and fishermen, Artisans (black smiths, carpenters, banogoozi – ceramics, bashakiizi – herbalists, bakomagyi – bark cloth makers etc.) and the feudal rulers.  The Europeans had used the 400 years since Columbus and Vasco Da Gama, to advance in Science (the steam engine, quinine etc.) and military technology (breech-loaders and the maxim machine gun).

Our chiefs, had misused the 400 years, fighting one another; but the Europeans, had used those 400 years to discover answers to our only reliable defenders: the long-distances of Africa and its jungle, rivers and forests; the mosquitoes and the tsetse flies; and the ferocious-tribesmen, but poorly led by the chiefs, poorly armed and isolated from one another by the same myopic chiefs but also by the difficult terrain.

By 1900, the Conquest of the whole of Africa was complete, except for Ethiopia.  As I have told Ugandans repeatedly, this conquest of Africa was potentially fatal.  Many of the other Peoples that were conquered, never survived.  The Red Indians of North America, the Aztecs of Mexico, the Incas of Peru, the Indians of Bolivia, the Indians of Brazil, the Caribes of the Caribbean, the Aborigines of Australia, the Maoris of New-Zealand, etc.  Many of these groups were either exterminated or are still greatly marginalized.  Their languages and cultures were replaced by European languages and cultures.  The languages in use now in those lands are: English, Spanish, Portuguese and French and not the indigenous languages of those peoples.

By the 1950s, part of Kenya was being called the “White Highlands”.  South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia were being paraded around as White Countries.  Angola, Mozambique, Guinnea Bissau and Cape Verde and Sao Tome were “Overseas Provinces of Portugal”.  The complicating and redeeming factor in Africa were the genes of the Africans and the advanced civilization of Africa.  We could not easily die because our cattle, goats, chicken, that stayed with us in our huts, had long inoculated us against the zoonotic diseases.  We, therefore, survived in spite of the slave trade, the genocide, the colonial wars, the hard labour etc.

When we, therefore, met at Igongo as CEC on the 23rd of December, 2018, I proposed to CEC in the Paper I presented, that while addressing the issues of Uganda’s Political – Social – Economic metamorphosis, we should ask the following questions:

  • How was Uganda’s economy in 1900?
  • How was it in 1962-1971?
  • How was the economy in 1986?
  • How is it now?
  • Where do we intend to take it?  And what stimuli shall we use to achieve our goals?

This way of erecting milestones, can help us discipline the discussion.  The Manifesto is a voluminous and comprehensive document that has dealt with these questions following my proposal to them.  I thank the Manifesto Committee so much that was led by Prof. Ephraim Kamuntu.

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EU pledges to learn lessons from coronavirus pandemic with new food security plan
Nov 2 2020
EU pledges to learn lessons from coronavirus pandemic with new food security plan
The EU has promised to learn lessons from the coronavirus pandemic by developing a new food security contingency plan.

Abi Kay

Abi took up the post of chief reporter at Farmers Guardian after a stint working for the NFU as part of its government affairs team.
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Abi took up the post of chief reporter at Farmers Guardian after a stint working for the NFU as part of its government affairs team.
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EU pledges to learn lessons from coronavirus pandemic with new food security plan

The plan, designed to ensure a continued supply of safe, affordable and nutritious food during crises, will be put together by the Commission alongside a broader Farm to Fork Strategy.

The Farm to Fork Strategy aims to make food systems fairer, healthier and more environmentally friendly, and is part of the European Green Deal which sets out a roadmap to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050.

A statement on the European Commission website launching the strategy said: “Food systems cannot be resilient to crises such as the Covid-19 pandemic if they are not sustainable.

“We need to redesign our food systems which today account for nearly one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions, consume large amounts of natural resources, result in biodiversity loss and negative health impacts (due to both under- and over-nutrition) and do not allow fair economic returns and livelihoods for all actors, in particular for primary producers.”

The strategy is very wide-ranging, including targets to reduce the use of pesticides by 50 per cent, fertiliser by 20 per cent and sales of antimicrobials for farmed animals by 50 per cent by 2030.

Animal welfare legislation, including on transport and slaughter, is to be revised and certification and labelling on the sustainability performance of food products introduced.

A new set of ‘eco-schemes’ will be developed for farmers, offering funding to boost sustainable practices such as precision agriculture, agro-ecology and agro-forestry, while new revenue streams for sequestering carbon will also be created.

The document goes on to recommend that member states make ‘more targeted’ use of VAT rates to improve diets, by supporting organic fruit and vegetables.

There is a strong focus in the strategy on ensuring other countries move towards sustainable practices alongside the EU.

Importer

The Commission statement said: “The EU is the biggest importer and exporter of agri-food products and the largest seafood market in the world.

“The production of commodities can have negative environmental and social impacts in the countries where they are produced.

“Therefore, efforts to tighten sustainability requirements in the EU food system should be accompanied by policies which help raise standards globally, in order to avoid the externalisation and export of unsustainable practices.”

Proposals to meet this aim include examining EU rules to reduce dependency on soya grown on deforested land and reviewing import tolerances for certain plant protection products.

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Keeping an eye on the grain market - October 1 update
Nov 2 2020
Keeping an eye on the grain market – October 1 update
Ongoing uncertainty regarding Brexit and the UK’s future trading relationship with the EU.



 

Marianne Curtis

Growing up on a family farm in North Yorkshire – Marianne had an early introduction to handling livestock and driving tractors.

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Marianne Curtis

Growing up on a family farm in North Yorkshire – Marianne had an early introduction to handling livestock and driving tractors.

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Harvest delays and the need for wheat to be dried or re-conditioned is limiting the tonnage entering the supply chain.

Due to the drought-like conditions in Ukraine, the winter wheat area currently being planted is already being forecast down 10% year-on-year.

The USDA’s bullish stocks report comprehensively wrong-footed the market, as both corn and soya bean stocks came in substantially under market expectations.

Nov-20 LIFFE wheat futures closed on Wednesday, September 30 at £183.70/tonne, a rise of £3.70/t on the week.

UK: UK spot market underpinned by supply shortage

Harvest delays and the need for wheat to be dried or re-conditioned is limiting the tonnage entering the supply chain.

This shortage has kept the spot physical market underpinned and created a squeeze on the London futures markets as merchant shorts try to liquidate their position, due to the forward carry in the market being totally eroded.

This season the UK will have to increase its dependency on imports to balance the books, increasingly so according to a recent AHDB release that projected end-season 2019/20 wheat stocks almost one million tonnes below its May figure.

Although AHDB increased domestic usage slightly, the 824,000t residual (unexplained loss) was attributed to the likelihood that the 2019 crop was overstated and that the fed-on-farm figure was higher than previously envisaged.

All in all, the lower carry-in increases the volume of imports required this season; to offset it we would need a substantial fall in demand for wheat, whether due to increased use of other cereals or non-grain feed ingredients, or simply a reduction in industrial, food and feed demand within the UK.

Tighter restrictions due to the resurgence of Covid-19 may affect domestic feed and food demand, but the level and pricing of imports will be dependent on the strength or weakness of sterling.

The picture is not made any easier by the ongoing uncertainty regarding Brexit and the UK’s future trading relationship with the EU.

David Woodland, ADM Agriculture

Global: Northern Hemisphere harvest virtually complete

Globally, with the Northern Hemisphere wheat harvest now virtually complete, attention is quickly turning to growing conditions in Argentina and Australia and planting conditions in Ukraine and Russia.

The chances of La Nina now stand at 80% probability, bringing dry conditions in South America and rainfall in Australia. The dry weather in Argentina has reduced the expected size of the wheat crop to 17.5 million tonne, 4.5mt below the July estimate. However, the flipside of wetter weather in Australia is maintaining confidence in a crop close to 29mt, with 19mt to export after Christmas, up 10mt year-on-year.

Due to the drought-like conditions in Ukraine, the winter wheat area currently being planted is already being forecast down 10% year-on-year. Dryness remains a concern in Russia too for winter wheat planting; with more than 60% of the area already planted, rainfall is very much needed now in southern Russia.

The UK wheat market remains tight, with slow farmer selling. On paper, 2020/21 now looks increasingly short of wheat, as the AHDB/Defra September Balance Sheet raised more questions than it gave answers. Wheat ending stock estimates for 2019/20 were reduced from 3.4mt to 2.4mt.

The discrepancy is most likely due to Defra overestimating 2019/20 production, but with such large swings, trust in ‘official’ data has been further eroded in a year of increased market volatility.

Peter Collier, CRM Agri

European: Wheat markets consolidate before USDA report triggers significant price rally

European wheat markets found support earlier this week, as a result of ongoing dry weather across much of the Black Sea and talk of further sales of French wheat to China. There are increasing concerns about the potential of the 2021 Russian wheat crop due to low levels of soil moisture.

Although planting has reached 60% of the planned area, in line with last year, rain is desperately needed for crops to germinate and establish ahead of the winter. But any notable amount is currently lacking.

Russia has previously signalled that it may introduce export curbs in the second half of this season, depending on the crop size and export pace. Concerns over the 2021 crops must also be a factor in ensuring sufficient domestic supplies are maintained. Russia’s Deputy Agriculture Minister, Oksana Luk, said that the country’s export quotas are relevant even with a good harvest.

Export restrictions for the world’s leading wheat exporter would create further price volatility, however, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) published its quarterly grain stocks report on Wednesday afternoon which proved the catalyst for an explosive price rally on futures markets.

The Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) wheat futures added over 6% to their value, followed by Paris and London wheat futures adding €5 and £4/t, respectively, before markets closed.

The data from the USDA took traders by surprise, with corn and soybean stocks 10% below expectations. Wheat was 5% below expectations and 10% lower than this time last year. The US 2020 wheat crop was also cut by just over 300,000t from previous estimates.

Simon Ingle

Oilseeds: Oilseed bulls gorge on USDA stocks report

Prior to the USDA releasing its latest stocks report on Wednesday evening, it had been one-way traffic for the global oilseeds markets. Down. Rapeseed, soya beans, vegetable oil and meal prices were all lower, week-on-week; some markedly so (KL palm oil, -6%). And for honest reasons; purchases of US soya beans by the Chinese had slowed dramatically.

As their ‘Golden Week’ holiday period loomed, the US dollar was on the front-foot, acting as a deadweight, US soya bean harvest progression beat expectations, at 20% complete, decent rains had fallen across Europe, aiding nubile rapeseed plant growth and all appeared ‘hunky and dory’ for Australia’s impending canola harvest.

Oilseed markets had thus been on the back-foot, especially with CBOT soya bean futures having recently established a massive, speculative long position (+200,000 lots), with enriched traders eager to book profits (sell).

However, the USDA’s bullish stocks report comprehensively wrong-footed the market, as both corn and soya bean stocks came in substantially under market expectations. Market sentiment quickly reversed, with US soya bean futures now seemingly entrenched above the key $10/bushel support level.

It will take a few trading sessions for these fresh US numbers to be fully digested by the market and for prices to settle. In the meantime, UK rapeseed sellers should sit tight and see where the dust settles. Short-term price prospects appear favourable, although having just been mightily fed, the Chicago bulls will need more feeding ahead to maintain back-fat levels.

Rupert Somerscales, ODA

Organic: Upward movement in grain values 

There are some encouraging signs of some upward movement in grain values which seem to be due to weakening of Sterling and some sentiment that the premium over conventional is too small given the gains made by the conventional market; but please don’t order a new combine.

Values are only edging upwards and are still below levels of last year. Feed grain values are about £40/t lower than this time last year which makes profitability marginal for many. Feed buyers remain concerned about potential lockdown and this is making them cautious about the cover they take.

We are still seeing very little interest in malting barley and beer sales will be further hit by the recent changes in socialising announced by the Government so there is little prospect of this market bouncing back quickly. One oat buyer reports having cover in place until the new year on carry-over stocks, reducing liquidity in the market but a cold spell of weather will hopefully get everyone eating porridge.

There is interest in milling wheat and buyers are coming to market and hopefully will respond to the slightly higher feed base with some improved bids. With some reports of panic buying starting we may see growth in demand for milling wheat as we did in March and April. We are seeing some good quality samples coming

through which is encouraging.

Andrew Trump, Organic Arable

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A fair EU food system
Nov 1 2020
A fair EU food system

Sustainability is at the centre stage of this European Commission’s programming period. The EU Green Deal is its flagship initiative which promises to set out the path to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by the year 2050. One of the instruments at the heart of this deal is the EU Farm to Fork Strategy – a comprehensive strategy which addresses externalities and inefficiencies all along the food supply chain, from food producers and manu­facturers, all the way up to retailers and consumers.

The strategy recognises that farmers, sellers, or consumers acting in isolation will not bring about a real change. Rather, the Commission aims to facilitate the transition for all involved, suggesting that this will ultimately make the EU food system fairer, healthier and more environmentally friendly.

The topics covered range from reducing pesticide use in farming, promoting healthier food options, better nutritional information, and a code of conduct for EU businesses working in the food system, among other proposals.

First and foremost, such a strategy should be welcomed as something that would help boost sustainability practices in EU member states. All actors within the EU food system must understand the important role they play in creating a sustainable market which also ensures healthy lifestyles for consumers. Businesses must in turn take aboard this social responsibility and look towards adapting their usual business models to account for a new green reality.

Nonetheless, there are certain points within the Farm to Fork strategy which need to be considered more carefully. Proposals such as nutritional information being inserted into restaurant menus, for instance, risk going beyond the actual scope of the strategy, by harming the restaurant experience.

The Farm to Fork strategy is being framed in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to ensure reliable food supplies across Europe. What the strategy fails to recognise, however, is the severe economic hardship that the pandemic has created for businesses in the hospitality industry. This is especially so in southern Europe, where countries depend on this industry proportionally more to provide jobs and growth. Requirements such as the above will not only harm the restaurant experience, but will actually introduce additional costs for businesses, most of which are small or micro enterprises.

If food waste were a country, it would be third highest emitter of greenhouse gases

Concerns on potentially higher costs for businesses can be found all along the supply chain. For instance, the stra­tegy pushes for a greater focus on organic farming but assumes that the typically more expensive organic products will be sold at conventional prices. With space at a premium in our country the same weights cannot be placed on such focuses on all member states. Unless the necessary financial support is provided, as well as the differing situations in each member, such an expectation is unrealistic, especially for EU businesses competing with non-EU imports.

If farmers are not able to meet the sustainability targets set by the Farm to Fork strate­gy, this may result in a reduction in supply of quality and sustainable produce due to lower yields, which would impact the affordability of primary products available to food and drink manufacturers, who would have to increase imports, thereby negating some of the environmental achievements this strategy envisions. This potentially raises operational costs and subsequently, consumer prices.

The Farm to Fork strategy also addresses an important issue, which is food waste reduction and prevention within the supply chain. This is especially important if the strategy is to properly tie into the EU’s circular economy action plan and the wider United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

We have become increasingly aware of the impact that food loss and waste have on the environment. Staggering statistics indicate that if food waste were a country, it would be third highest emitter of greenhouse gases, right after the United States and China. According to the UN, food waste and loss contributes to around eight per cent of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.

Any meaningful strategy that seeks to improve the sustainability of Europe’s food system and reduce its impact on our climate needs to adopt food waste reduction and prevention as key priorities. This should include a review of existing EU food policies such as the Common Agricultural Policy, which is known to generate excess supply of certain food products, leading to waste, as well as common EU rules on food donations.

Aside from this environmental impact, there are serious economic concerns surrounding food waste. It is estimated that around 88 million tonnes of food is wasted in Europe every year, costing member states €143 billion – money that could have been used for much more productive practices than simply throwing away food.

One also must consider how this strategy relates to other aspects of food production, such as packaging. The Commission has promised to revise legislation to improve food safety while increasing the use of new and greener packaging solutions made of reusable and recyclable materials. It will also work on similar policies to help cut down on single-use materials in the food service sector.

It is crucial that these changes have no significant negative impact on food quality and the shelf-life of our pro­ducts, and are introduced in a gradual approach to allow businesses to move to alternative products that are commercially available and cost-effective.

The EU Farm to Fork strategy can be considered an important step in the right direction, yet any measures must be pro­perly assessed in advance and taken in consultation with interested stakeholders to avoid unnecessary burdens being placed on businesses, especially smaller ones that might not be able to cope with excessive bureaucratic and financial obligations. It is only by taking into consideration the needs of all actors involved, including businesses, that we can really foster a fair and sustainable EU food system.

Finally, the Farm to Fork strategy should not just be about policy and legislation, but should also include proactive voluntary initiatives to address the issue. From a local perspective, the Malta Business Bureau is already taking this issue very seriously.

It is implementing several initiatives on this front, from collaborations with educational institutions to deliver sustainable food service, to general awareness raising campaigns among employees on the value of food and the importance of food waste reduction. We have already kickstarted the discussions on the Farm to Fork strategy and we look forward to further reaching out to key actors in this important area.

Simon De Cesare, president, Malta Business Bureau

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Eco Blue Seafood targeting Chinese mud crab demand with new Indonesian RAS
Oct 31 2020
Eco Blue Seafood targeting Chinese mud crab demand with new Indonesian RAS

An ambitious new aquaculture enterprise is aiming to produce mud crab in a sustainable manner using European technology in Indonesia for the Chinese market. Roskilde, Denmark-based Eco Blue Seafood is planning on commencing construction of a recirculating aquaculture system facility in Indonesia next year. The firm is working with the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) and their Aquaculture department on nutrition during the hatchery and nursery phases, while also engaging Danish Hydraulic Institute (DHI) as consultant on water resources and technology. The project’s  ‘turnkey partner’ is Danish company Alpha Aqua. In an interview, Eco Blue Seafood CEO Martin A. Pedersen told SeafoodSource the firm is hoping to tap private and public investors in Asia, Europe, and the U.S. to finance the project.

SeafoodSource: What is the basis for your profitability thesis in targeting the mud crab market in China?

Pedersen: We know from our global seafood trading partner and their people in China that premium-quality, live, extra-large mud crabs are in high and continuously increasing demand, which is also reflected in market prices. Furthermore, we follow what is going on in the Southeast Asia region and where most of the supply of mud crab is being exported to mainland China, Hong Kong, Korea, and Singapore. Whether demand is high or supply is low is in the eyes of the beholder, but there is definitely a huge gap between the two, and Eco Blue Seafood intends to fill it.

SeafoodSource: Who is your retail or distribution partner in China?

Pedersen: Our trading partner in China is the Sirena Group from Denmark. They have been trading primarily frozen seafood to Chinese customers for more than 30 years and enjoy great brand loyalty and recognition. Live mud crab from Eco Blue Seafood will be sold to the highest bidder, but the primary focus is modern fresh seafood supermarkets.

SeafoodSource: In what part of Indonesia is your project located?

Pedersen: The Eco Blue Seafood sustainable production setup will be located in the southern part of the Riau Islands, very close to Batam and Singapore, the latter being both a strategic trading and R&D hub for aquaculture seafood in the region. Being a primarily export-focused company, easy logistics and being close to the market is key. China is by far the largest consumer of live mud crab, but with the Singaporean national dish’s primary ingredient being mud crab, this is definitely a very interesting market, too.

SeafoodSource: What is the investment in this project and what are the main sources of this investment?

Pedersen: The full investment to develop a total land area of approximately 1,000 hectares is USD 8 million (EUR 6.9 million). Eco Blue Seafood is open to different funding options. We are currently in dialogue with the Asian Development Bank, Danish Industrial Funds, private investors, accelerators, and venture capital. These represent anything from loans to equity investments. Finally, we have potential investments from strategic [sales and marketing and technology] partners, which would be the optimal investment partners for our company. We are looking for investors who are willing to commit to a minimum of seven to 10 years, and in return, they will get a very interesting return on their investment.

SeafoodSource: How unique or different is your RAS technology in Asia in mud crab production?

Pedersen: We are currently working closely with our Danish strategic RAS technology partner in order to determine exactly which technologies will have the biggest positive effect on the hatchery, nursery, and grow-out performance. Different RAS setups are being tested, but a floating RAS solution could be the end result. The most important thing is biosecurity and easy scalability. There is no doubt that Eco Blue Seafood will be bringing in much more technology for monitoring, traceability, power consumption, etcetera, and a much different laboratory approach to mud crab farming. But what we believe will be the biggest game-changer is our overall sustainable approach to aquaculture and our “Hatchery2Harvest” concept.

SeafoodSource: What is uniquely sustainable about your Hatchery2Harvest model; Are there similarly vertically integrated aquaculture models already in China?

Pedersen: High-quality, disease-free, live, extra-large mud crab is our brand, and for us to be able to guarantee this, we must be in control of every step from broodstock to harvest, packaging, and transportation. At Eco Blue Seafood, we even work on horizontal integration as well, with our production concept creating several related spinoff opportunities. Chinese consumers prefer to eat imported seafood, because of the lack of trust towards local manufacturers. Denmark is a pioneer within organic food, and mud crab from Eco Blue Seafood will be grown according to the very same principles. We will be bringing the world’s best mud crab to consumers, and we will be doing it with respect for the environment, our climate, the wildlife, and the local communities where we operate. This in the end is what makes Eco Blue Seafood and our Hatchery2Harvest concept unique, because no one combines a healthy business and an urge to do good like we do.

SeafoodSource: Is renewable energy still a big part of your plan?

Pedersen: Renewable energy and green energy consumption are absolutely still part of our concept. We are working closely with solar power developer German ASEAN Power on utilizing some of our land area for solar parks and potentially floating panels. Eco Blue Seafood has an ambition to run the entire hatchery and grow-out process on solar power and even feeding excess power production into the local grid, thereby helping the local community make the change to renewable energy sources.

SeafoodSource: Will you aim to obtain any ecolabel or sustainability certification recognized in China?

Pedersen: It is one of the company’s main ambitions to build a concept and a company worthy of especially the Aquaculture Stewardship Council certification. Our sales and marketing partner enjoys a very strong brand in China, having been present in the market for more than 30 years. This will of course rub off on Eco Blue Seafood, but we want to establish a new standard within commercial mud crab aquaculture which the world has never seen before.

SeafoodSource: Have you encountered any hesitance from investors in Asia worried about the technology, species, diseases, insurance, or other issues specifically related to aquaculture?

Pedersen: We think that many investors all over the world are very keen to invest in aquaculture, but we also experience that most investors, if already involved in aquaculture, tend to stick to one species. If you are into salmon, you are into salmon; If you are into shrimp, you are into shrimp. That being said, we do see a tendency towards more Asian investments into aquaculture in general. Asia represents some of the largest and fastest-growing populations, who on top eat a lot of seafood. With seas being increasingly overfished, aquaculture is the only solution. But again, most new investments are made into the most dominant cold- and warm-water species. Aquaculture in Asia is primarily warm-water, which is a catalyst for viruses and diseases if broodstock, water quality, biosecurity, and monitoring is not under control. Attempts to improve Asian aquaculture are being made as we speak, especially within shrimp. But technology does not change the fact that shrimp are very vulnerable animals. We encounter all the same risk-related questions from investors all over the world, but we have answers ready for all of them, and we have absolutely no doubt that our concept, our species, and our technology will be a great success and a thing of tomorrow.

SeafoodSource: Will you work with e-commerce or traditional retailers in China?

Pedersen: The initial plan is to sell solely through the retail channels of our sales and marketing partner. They have an extensive network amongst high-end fresh supermarkets demanding premium-quality, live, extra-large mud crab on a continuous basis. But there will be many other potential buyers and client segments both within China and across the Asian region. Furthermore, mud crab is in demand in Southern Europe and North America, both live, frozen, and processed, so market possibilities are endless. At Eco Blue Seafood, we also have several commercial “next steps” involving selling directly to luxury hotels and high-end restaurants, which have their own “vertical farming” setup in order to provide their guests the ultimate fresh mud crab experience. With the proper logistics setup, e-commerce and home delivery could even become an option, but this is further down the line.

Photo courtesy of Eco Blue Seafood

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Give growing blueberries a go
Oct 30 2020
Give growing blueberries a go
Blueberries have the highest antioxidant levels, gram for gram, of any fruit.

Every supermarket sells blueberries, but why not try growing them at home, suggests gardening writer CEDRIC BRYANT. 

ENJOY them fresh, with ice cream or on breakfast cereal, as a jam or even a wine. Every supermarket sells blueberries, but why not grow them at home? 

Blueberries were first imported into Europe from North America in the 1930s. Commercial production in Australia didn’t start until the 1970s, when the Victorian Department of Agriculture imported seeds from the USA. 

Cedric Bryant.

Interestingly, North American Indians were harvesting blueberries in the wild for several centuries before European settlement. 

Clive Blazey of the Diggers Club suggests blueberries have the highest antioxidant levels, gram for gram, of any fruit. 

Blueberries, which are self-pollinating, grow well in this area. They thrive best in acid soil, the same as rhododendrons and camellias, blending in well with these with their white-to-pink flowers and brilliant autumn leaf colour. Similarly, blueberries must be grown in well-drained soil, and at least eight hours sunlight a day is essential. 

Plant 1.5 metres apart and mulch well, as blueberries have a shallow root system, similar to other acid-loving plants. When first planted and for the first few months, feed regularly with an organic liquid seaweed plant food.

It’s vital the soil doesn’t dry out, as with all fruiting plants, so the ideal watering system is the drip method. The fruit is borne on the previous season’s growth, with vigorous new wood producing the most fruit. Birds love to eat blueberries too, so netting is vital once the flowers appear.

Heavy pruning should not be done in the first four years, except for shaping and removing dead or spindly growth in the dormant winter period. Harvesting usually happens in December, when the fruit turns a deep purple. Store them fresh in the fridge, or freeze without any loss of goodness. 

Ceanothus presents a spectacular splash of blue at this time.

CEANOTHUS, or Californian lilac, is native to many parts of the USA. Like blueberries, North American Indians used the leaves for an alternative to our tea and for medicinal purposes.

They were once popular in gardens here, and in 1979 ceanothus “Blue Pacific” was named as the shrub of the year. This one grows to about two-metres-plus, although there are numerous other low-growing varieties. Their popularity waned, mainly due to not understanding their management. Unlike most shrubs, if left for a number of years and then pruned back into the old wood, it never grows back. Prune immediately after flowering, by up to but not more than, one-third. This can be used as a hedge or individual plant. They are extremely drought tolerant.

MOST lemons have now finished fruiting. No systemic pruning is usually necessary, but now is a good time to carry out a light prune, shortening long, scraggly branches and taking out any dead, diseased or damaged wood; usually caused by storm damage. Follow this up with a feed.

DON’T throw away a potted cyclamen if the leaves have died down. Plant it in the garden in a semi-shady spot, underneath deciduous trees, where it can receive winter sun. If in an ornamental pot, simply turn it on its side for the summer. By early next autumn, stand it upright and start regular watering. Make sure the potting mix is well saturated before applying liquid seaweed fertiliser, which will encourage new root growth. 

THE scraggly, messy-looking leaves of spring-flowering bulbs can be cut to ground level and put in the compost. Any bulbs in the wrong spot can be dug up now. I find orange bags are ideal for storing bulbs, as they provide good circulation. Hang in a dry, airy place such as the garage or shed until planting time next March.

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Total System Services Inc (TSS) Q3 2020 Earnings Call Transcript
Oct 30 2020
Total System Services Inc (TSS) Q3 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

Image source: The Motley Fool.

Total System Services Inc (NYSE:TSS)
Q3 2020 Earnings Call
Oct 30, 2020, 8:00 p.m. ET

Contents:

  • Prepared Remarks
  • Questions and Answers
  • Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by, and welcome to Global Payments Third Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions]

At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to your host, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations, Winnie Smith. Please go ahead.

Winnie Smith — Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Before we begin, I’d like to remind you that some of the comments made by management during today’s conference call contain forward-looking statements about expected operating and financial results. These statements are subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors, including the impact of COVID-19 and economic conditions on our future operations that could cause actual results to differ materially from our expectations. Certain risk factors inherent in our business are set forth in filings with the SEC, including our most recent 10-K and subsequent filings. We caution you not to place undue reliance on these statements. Forward-looking statements during this call speak only as of the date of this call, and we undertake no obligation to update them. Some of the comments made refer to non-GAAP financial measures, such as adjusted net revenue, adjusted operating margin and adjusted earnings per share, which we believe are more reflective of our ongoing performance. For a full reconciliation of these and other non-GAAP financial measures to the most comparable GAAP measures in accordance with SEC regulations, please see our press release furnished as an exhibit to our Form 8-K filed this morning and our trended financial highlights, both of which are available in the Investor Relations area of our website at www.globalpaymentsinc.com. Joining me on the call are Jeff Sloan, CEO; Cameron Bready, President and COO; and Paul Todd, Senior Executive Vice President and CFO.

Now I’ll turn the call over to Jeff.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Winnie. We delivered third quarter results that substantially exceeded our expectations because of our differentiated strategy and technology enablement to drive digital growth. Each of adjusted net revenue, adjusted operating margin and adjusted earnings per share significantly outperformed the targets we put in place post the pandemic outbreak, and we continue to gain share relative to our markets. We thank our team members for their hard work and dedication to our customers, to each other and to the communities in which we live and work during these most difficult times. We are particularly pleased with the significant level of operating margin expansion that we generated in the quarter. These results validate the actions we took at the beginning of the outbreak of COVID-19, both in timing and quantum. As a result, we are delighted to have returned to earnings growth in the third quarter of 2020. Our expectations are for continued progress in the fourth quarter, providing meaningful momentum heading into 2021. We are also pleased to continue to make substantial progress on our strategic goals this year, extending our lead and deepening our competitive moat. Year-to-date, we entered into a landmark collaboration with Amazon Web Services, our preferred provider of cloud services for our issuer business, cross the 60% threshold of our business coming from technology enablement, the goal we set in March 2018 for year-end 2020 and purchased an additional 29% of our joint venture in October with CaixaBank in Spain and Portugal, two of the most attractive domestic markets in Europe.

And we did all this during a once-in-a-century pandemic, while meaningfully expanding market share by signing marquee competitive takeaways, including Truist, the sixth largest bank in the United States, and by extending relationships with some of the largest, most sophisticated and complex financial institutions worldwide, including HSBC, CIBC, TD Bank and Wells Fargo. Turning to our merchant business. Our technology-enabled portfolio consists of three roughly equally sized channels. Our omnichannel, partner software and owned software vertical markets businesses collectively represent nearly 60% of merchant revenue. Our relationship-led businesses make up the remaining portion and continue to differentiate themselves in the markets we serve based on the strength of our technology offerings. Starting with our market-leading omnichannel capabilities, we are unique in our ability to offer local sales and operational support at scale physically in 38 countries and to provide services plus quarter virtually into 100. That scale and reach, particularly in many of the hardware served markets we operate in today, is a significant competitive advantage. Volumes in this channel grew in the mid-teens during the third quarter compared to the prior year, excluding travel and entertainment.

With changing consumer preferences as a tailwind, we believe we will sustain higher levels of growth in our omnichannel businesses on an ongoing basis coming out of the pandemic as channel shift and market share gains continue. Our ability to seamlessly provide the full spectrum of payment solutions drove new wins this quarter with large multinationals, including Yves Saint Laurent, Alexander McQueen and Fedex, each of which spans multiple geographies. Additionally, we recently signed a new multiyear partnership with Uber in Taiwan to provide payment solutions for both Uber Rides and Uber Eats. The Uber agreement was one as a result of the strength of our domestic capabilities. We were also excited to expand our current relationship with global storage solutions company, PODS, beyond North America and Canada into Australia. We went live with Citi in Canada this quarter on our unified commerce platform, or UCP, and we are now pursuing customers jointly across North America and United Kingdom. We are also pleased to announce that we have agreed to expand our partnership with Citi across Continental Europe, and we expect to launch those new UCP markets in the first half of 2021.

Global payments integrated GPI returned to growth in the third quarter because of the unliable breadth of our partnership portfolio with over 4,000 ISVs in the most attractive vertical markets. Prior to COVID-19, our integrated business consistently delivered double-digit organic revenue growth through market share gains and terrific ongoing execution. Through our merger with TSYS, we meaningfully increased the scale of the partner portfolio and enhanced our capabilities with additional assets like Genius and ProPay. The strength of our combined integrated offerings allowed this business to achieve its budgeted new sales forecast for the third quarter, with new partner production increasing over 70% versus 2019. Notable new wins include partnerships with CDK Global, a leading provider of automated software solutions to more than 20,000 dealerships around the world as well as with Sandhills, a large private auction software provider focused on the industrial equipment and machinery market. We also signed Pentair, a leader in software solutions for field service providers, including Pentair’s own 17,000 plus dealers in addition to independent service companies.

Our own software businesses represent the remaining roughly 20% of our technology-enabled merchant revenue, and our leading SaaS solutions in healthcare, higher education and quick service restaurant, or QSR, have been more resilient in the current environment. Even in our businesses that have been more impacted by the pandemic, including active in our K-12 primary education and gaming businesses, we are seeing sequential improvement, giving us increased confidence for 2021. Our strategy of delivering the full value stack in key verticals continues to produce deeper, richer and more value-added relationships with customers and is becoming table stakes in the markets we serve. Our enterprise QSR business continued its success with Xenial’s online ordering and delivery solutions, which has now enabled more than 62 million orders and greater than $1 billion in sales in 2020. We also completed the rollout of our cloud-based SaaS point-of-sale solution with Dutch Bros, and we are currently installing our POS solutions in all Long John Silver’s locations in the United States. And we have now integrated our Genius payment solutions from TSYS into our Xenial offerings, significantly expanding our cross-sell capabilities. Today, we lead with technology and innovative solutions across all of our merchant businesses. This includes our relationship channels where we continue to see strong new sales performance, fueled by our suite of differentiated products and solutions.

For example, in our Heartland business, nearly 2/3 of new sales are technology-driven, including our leading POS software and online ordering solutions. We have seen strong demand for these offerings during the pandemic. Heartland delivered record new sales performance in the third quarter. And while we continue to focus on new technologies and markets, we have not lost sight of our long-standing partnerships with some of the largest, most sophisticated and complex financial institutions worldwide. We are delighted to announce that we have renewed our relationship with HSBC in the United Kingdom for merchant services. This comes a little over a decade after we entered that market with our joint venture. We also recently executed a new merchant referral agreement with CIBC in Canada, a partnership that began right before our IPO in early 2001. Extended relationships in Europe with HSBC and in Canada with CIBC closely followed the expansion of our partnership with CaixaBank in Spain and Portugal. We are thrilled to have closed in early October on the agreement to purchase an additional 29% of Comercia, increasing our ownership stake to 80%. Our exclusive referral relationship now expands through 2040, 30 years after the initial joint venture date. We are humbled by the confidence that our partners place in us every day. Regarding our issuer business, we announced last quarter a transformational go-to-market collaboration with Amazon Web Services, or AWS, to provide an industry-leading cloud-based issuer processing platform for customers regardless of size, location or processing preference.

This is a game changer for three reasons. First, it levels the playing field by bringing leading-edge technologies previously available only to new entrants to financial institutions and retailers of all sizes worldwide. Second, it triples our target addressable market by extending our geographic footprint and transforming our technologies to attract new market entrants while dramatically expanding our distribution assets with AWS’ sales force globally on a unique basis. Third, it brings significant benefits to our customers and their consumers by enabling frictionless digital experiences in a safe commerce environment. Our collaboration with AWS is already bearing fruit. We are pleased to announce our first joined competitive takeaway, a financial institution customer in Asia currently with a legacy competitor to be boarded in our cloud-based solution in 2021. We also have recently been awarded new business with a large domestic financial institution in Europe on a cloud basis. Our issuer technology transformation is now fully under way and on track. As we continue to gain share through our unique collaboration, we will capitalize on the broad and deep pipeline we have the good fortune to have in our issuer business. We currently have 11 letters of intent with financial institutions worldwide, seven of which are competitive takeaways. In the last 18 months, we have had 33 competitive wins across North America and international markets.

Each market share gains are occurring right now in the midst of a pandemic and prior to full implementation of our cloud native solutions with AWS. All of this is, of course, in addition to significant renewal agreements that we executed this past quarter, including with TD Bank, Wells Fargo and Advanzia in Europe. We are also pleased to announce that we have secured long-term extensions with Arvest Bank as well as with Banco Popular in Puerto Rico, and that we have finalized an agreement with Scotiabank to convert its Canadian consumer credit card and loan accounts. Our business and consumer segment delivered high single-digit growth, achieving record third quarter revenues in a challenging macroeconomic environment and well after the April stimulus. This business also substantially expanded operating margins, which we drove by disciplined focus on expense management and execution since the merger. The shift to cashless solutions is benefiting us across the business and consumer portfolio, with customers remaining active longer and utilizing more of our products. As just one example, we are seeing rapid adoption of our TIPs solution with a number of customer locations using us for disbursement of fivefold since the beginning of the pandemic. We also signed a new strategic relationship with Austin Football Club, the newest MLS franchise, and we are working with the team in the stadium to develop a cashless payment account and processing ecosystem while also leveraging brand sponsorship opportunities. We closed on our new joint venture with MoneyToPay on October 1, which expands our target addressable market to include Continental Europe for the first time. We have no better partners in CaixaBank, and we believe the combination will offer significant growth opportunities for this business segment in the future. The new venture also validates the types of revenue synergies we anticipated at the time of our TSYS merger. Finally, the underlying strength of our businesses has enabled us to now return our focus toward the traditional capital allocation priorities that we’ve employed over the last seven years, return capital to shareholders and select M&A. We have put those initiatives on hold at the beginning of the COVID outbreak. It was difficult in March to imagine we would be in the position that we are in today. As a result, we look for more activity going forward subject, of course, to the capital markets environment and outlook.

Now over to Paul.

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Jeff. I’m extremely proud of the financial performance we achieved this quarter that once again exceeded our expectations, driven by strong execution of our differentiated technology-enabled strategy. Adjusted net revenue for the quarter was $1.75 billion, reflecting growth of 64% over 2019. Adjusted net revenue compared to the prior year on a combined basis was down just 4%, a meaningful improvement from the second quarter. Importantly, our adjusted operating margin increased an impressive 250 basis points to 41.1% as we benefited from the broad expense actions we took to address the impact of the pandemic and the realization of cost synergies related to the merger, which continue to track ahead of plan. The net result was adjusted earnings per share of $1.71 for the third quarter, which compares to $1.70 in the prior year period, an impressive outcome that highlights the durability and resiliency of our model. These results include an accrual for nonexecutive bonuses as our performance for the quarter substantially exceeded our expectations. We are pleased to be in a position to begin to reward our team members around the world who continue to deliver the highest standard of service to our customers. In our Merchant Solutions segment, we achieved adjusted net revenue of $1.13 billion for the third quarter, a 6% decline from the prior year on a combined basis and significant improvement from the second quarter.

Notably, we delivered an adjusted operating margin of 47.3% in this segment, an improvement of roughly 40 basis points as our cost initiatives and the underlying strength of our business mix more than offset top line headwinds from the macro environment. Our technology-enabled portfolio was relatively resilient once again with several of our businesses delivering year-over-year growth in the third quarter on a combined basis. Specifically, our worldwide omnichannel e-commerce volumes, excluding T&E, grew mid-teens as our unique value proposition, including our unified commerce platform, or UCP, continues to resonate with customers. Also, global payments integrated delivered adjusted net revenue growth in the quarter on a combined basis, while the leading scale and scope of our ecosystem has this business on pace to deliver another record year for new partner production. As for our own software portfolio, AdvancedMD remained a bright spot, producing strong adjusted net revenue growth and once again delivering record bookings during the third quarter. Moving to our relationship-led businesses. We are pleased to have realized solid sequential improvement across geographies this quarter, and payment volumes continued to recover around the world. Once again, execution in these businesses remained very strong this quarter, as evidenced by the new sales performance Jeff highlighted earlier and share gains we have realized. Turning to Issuer Solutions. We delivered $433 million in adjusted net revenue for the third quarter, representing a 2.5% decline from the prior year period on a combined basis. As transaction volumes are recovering, traditional accounts on file continue to grow in the mid-single digits and set a new record for the quarter, and our bundled pricing model, including value-added products and services, benefits performance.

In fact, excluding our commercial card business, which represents approximately 20% of our issued portfolio and is being impacted by limited corporate travel, this segment delivered low single-digit growth for the quarter on a combined basis. Adjusted segment operating margin for issuer expanded a very strong 500 basis points to 43.3% compared to the prior year on a combined basis as we continue to benefit from our efforts to drive efficiencies in the business. Finally, our Business and Consumer Solutions segment delivered adjusted net revenue of $204 million, a record third quarter result, representing growth of more than 7% from the prior year. Netspend continues to benefit from strong trends in gross dollar volume, which increased 12% for the quarter, an impressive outcome in light of the environment and in the absence of incremental stimulus. We are pleased that Netspend customers remain active and are utilizing our products for purchases as we are seeing a shift to cashless spending in this channel as well. We are particularly pleased by trains with our DDA products, with active account growth increasing 24% from the prior year. Adjusted operating margin for this segment improved 710 basis points to 25.6% as we benefit from the efforts we have made over the past year to streamline costs and drive greater operational efficiencies in this business. The powerful combination of Global Payments and TSYS has provided us with multiple levers to mitigate the headwinds we have faced from the pandemic. We are making great progress on our integration, which I mentioned, continues to track ahead of plan. It has been just over one year since we closed our merger, and we have the confidence to again raise our estimate for annual run rate expense synergies from the merger to at least $375 million within three years, up from our previous estimate of $350 million.

This marks the third time we have increased our cost synergy expectations. We also remain confident in our ability to deliver at least $125 million in annual run rate revenue synergies and the $400 million in additional annual run rate expense savings related to the pandemic, which is incremental to the TSYS merger synergies. As we sit here today, our business is healthy, and we are able to return to our capital allocation priorities. We generated roughly $500 million in adjusted free cash flow this quarter, essentially funding our purchase of an additional 29% stake in our joint venture with CaixaBank. We reinvested approximately $120 million of capex back into the business. We ended the quarter with roughly $3 billion of liquidity and a leverage position of roughly 2.5 times on a net debt basis. Given our strong liquidity and balance sheet strength, we are pleased to announce that our Board of Directors has increased our share repurchase authorization to $1.25 billion, while we continue executing against the full pipeline of merger and acquisition opportunities. While we are not providing guidance at this time, we currently expect to have margin expansion and earnings-per-share growth for the fourth quarter, providing us with strong momentum heading into 2021. Additionally, assuming the recovery continues to progress and we see a more normal environment in 2021, we are currently targeting adjusted earnings per share of roughly $8 for next year. We are grateful for our market leadership in global scaling payments, while the proliferation of technology and software in our industry should allow us to continue to drive meaningful share gains well into the future.

And with that, I’ll turn the call back over to Jeff.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

I am very proud of all that we have accomplished thus far in 2020 as we execute on our strategic initiatives. This will be a remarkable year regardless of the macroeconomic environment, but it is all the more notable in the face of a 100-year pandemic. AWS, CaixaBank and crossing a 60% digital enablement threshold, just to name a few of the noteworthy accomplishments. Our new collaborations with market-leading technology companies such as AWS, combined with distinctive partnerships with some of the largest and most complex institutions in the world such as HSBC, CIBC and CaixaBank, provide further validation of the wisdom of our differentiated strategies. We are enthusiastic about the future as we continue to advance our technology-enabled software-driven goals, building upon our competitive advantages to widen our moat and to create significant long-term value for our shareholders. Winnie?

Winnie Smith — Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Before we begin our question-and-answer session, I’d like to ask everyone to limit their questions to one with one follow-up to accommodate everyone in the queue. Thank you. Operator, we will now go to questions.

Questions and Answers:

Operator

Your first question comes from the line of Darrin Peller with Wolfe Research.

Darrin Peller — Wolfe Research — Analyst

All right. Jeff, I just want to start off with your strategy around acquisitions and really the technologies and capabilities you really think you can use to fill out what’s already obviously showing to hold up — hold its own pretty well. And then just on top of that, any data points you can give us on how you’re kind of filling the funnel on the top in terms of bookings, new business trends in the merchant business versus any attrition levels would be great.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Darrin. It’s Jeff, and I’ll start. I’m sure Cameron and Paul can comment on your second question. But on your first question, listen, our strategy has not changed the company probably over the last number of years, and that is to say that we have three legs to the stool. Those legs to the stool include owned and partnered software, include e-commerce and omnichannel businesses and exposure to faster growth market. So I’d say pretty much all the deals that we look at fall into one or more of those three buckets. We’re really pleased about where we are today. And Paul, of course, mentioned this in his prepared comments, is that we sit here today in a healthy position as we’ve ever been, but particularly much healthier than we would have guessed probably back in March or April. As Paul said, there was never a day on a net basis, 2.5 times, and we have $3 billion of liquidity. Our M&A pipeline is pretty full. But obviously, some of that depends on some stability, of course, in the capital markets.

So you saw our announcement today about our Board, thankfully, increasing our share repurchase authorization. For the time being, the best investment, I think, is us, given our performance and where the markets have been. Having said though, we continue to execute against that pipeline, and we’re well capitalized to pursue those opportunities. So I think we’re in a really happy place, Darrin. And I would say our strategy has not changed, and you probably saw this in our release as well as our prepared comments. We’ve actually now crossed the 60% threshold of our merchant business coming from digital trends, which is something that we started talking about in 2015 and 2018. We set that target in our last Investor Day in 2018. For the end of this year, we crossed that threshold in the third quarter. So I think that’s been working really well for us. I don’t really see that changing. And if we were to do additional acquisitions subject to market conditions, they would probably fall on lines of those three buckets. So Cameron, do you want to talk a little about the second question?

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Yes, sure. Darrin, I’ll touch on that. I’m going to focus on North America since that represents about 80% of our merchant business. But I would tell you, the one thing that we tried to do during the midst of the pandemic is focused on the things that we can control, and that starts with new sales. And I would say the new sales performance across our businesses have really been exceptional. Heartland had a record new sales production period in the third quarter, up double digits year-over-year, up 25% sequentially versus the second quarter. Again, the strongest new sales performance period in the history of that business. Our integrated business, as we noted in our prepared comments, is tracking to budget for the year, notwithstanding the pandemic. New partner production is up 70% year-over-year. And I would say, the overall partner pipeline is as strong as it’s ever been in that business. And we’re pretty optimistic about the momentum we have heading into Q4 and 2021 in our integrated channel. In vertical markets, we saw a particular strength in AdvancedMD. That’s a continuing theme, obviously, we touched on throughout the pandemic. Their new bookings were up 15% year-over-year. In Xenial, our QSR enterprise business. We saw new SaaS sales, up 30% year-over-year. In our higher education business, new bookings are tracking at a consistent level with 2019 despite a number of campuses being closed during the midst of the pandemic.

So we’re pleased with that performance as well. Canada saw new sales up 12% year-over-year in the quarter — or excuse me, year-over-year, year-to-date, they’re up 28% in Q3. So again, continued strong strength in the Canadian market, largely on the heels of our new partnership with Desjardins, which continues to bear free for us in that market. In Europe and Asia, overall, I’ll just touch on briefly, I think their performance has been very strong, notwithstanding the environment they’ve been operating in. New sales remain solid in all those markets. The U.K. has had some significant new wins this quarter that we’re particularly pleased with. Spain continues to be a strong performer for us. Midtown is up in Spain year-over-year. Domestic volumes are up 5%, 6% in Spain year-over-year. We see particular strength in that market as well. And then Asia, again, new sales performance has been very good. Obviously, the overall macro in Asia continues to be a bit soft, given the impact of the pandemic. But I would say, just overall in the business, going back to my opening comments, we are exceptionally pleased with the pace of new sales and how we’ve executed with new sales and bookings throughout the pandemic, but particularly in Q3.

Darrin Peller — Wolfe Research — Analyst

That’s really helpful, guys. Great detail. I mean it sounds like — and I’ll leave it at this, but it sounds like, overall, the technology offerings you have is enabling. You guys can gain share to a degree that you come out of the pandemic potentially larger or in line or larger than you could have been before. Is that fair just based on the type of differentiation you’re seeing versus maybe some of the banks out there?

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes. I think we’re certainly — our opinion, you look at Visa and Mastercard just right there, which on a combined basis, I view as kind of the market, and these numbers obviously are multiples better than those numbers. So with that, that I think supports our thesis that we’re rapidly gaining share in pretty much every one of our businesses as we look at it, especially for these purposes, our merchant business. So I think what you said is exactly right. And that in addition to the bookings numbers, which are great leading indicators that Cameron alluded to make us feel really good about the trajectory of the business.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Dave Koning with Baird.

Dave Koning — Baird — Analyst

Okay. Nice job.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Dave.

Dave Koning — Baird — Analyst

Yes. And maybe could you review monthly trends in — especially in merchant, maybe — I know you did down 6% year-over-year, but did that improve throughout the quarter? And maybe how is that setting up into October?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes. So maybe I’ll start, and Cameron can give a little more insight. Yes, the monthly trends continue to kind of have good both stabilization and kind of sequential monthly growth. And so we had said for some time now that from a merchant standpoint, our volumes looked a lot like the Visa credit volumes. But most recently, started positively decoupling from those volumes and trending better. And we saw that obviously in the third quarter relative to the Visa volumes that came back yesterday, and we’re continuing to see that improvement in the several weeks here of October that we’ve seen so far. So yes, the trends continue to be positive. The [Indecipherable] kind of how we’ve described them. And obviously, the results flow-through from those relative to the financial performance for the quarter. Cameron, do you want to add to that?

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Yes. I would just add a couple of things. I think if you look at Q3, we saw obviously continued improvements throughout the quarter. I think the pace of recovery, as we’ve seen over the last couple of months, has begun to slow. And I think that’s pretty consistent with the industry data that has been published as well. We see October trending a little bit better than September. But as it relates to the exit rate for September, I think it’s important to look at the merchant business in a couple of ways. One is, if you exclude our vertical market businesses that have been most heavily impacted during the pandemic, lower indication where schools are largely closed, our active business, where obviously insurance and sporting events have been largely shut down and gaming where obviously our casino business, has been heavily impacted by the pandemic.

If you exclude those, our merchant business for the quarter in the U.S. was roughly flat, down a point or so. So I call that roughly flat for the quarter. And Asia is — September, essentially flat. So I think we have good momentum heading into October in that business. And obviously, that’s a strong sequential improvement over where we were in the second quarter. So certainly, as it relates to North America, again, which is 80% of the merchant business, the trends we’ve seen are positive. October is a slight improvement over September. We’re obviously monitoring that closely as I think the entire world continues to struggle with the pandemic. But the trends we’ve seen thus far are encouraging as we continue to grind higher as a recovery matter heading into 2021.

Dave Koning — Baird — Analyst

Great. And just a quick follow-up. Normally, in Q4, merchants, the seasonality of merchant is for revenues to come in a little bit sequentially and margins to be down a bit. But given kind of the recovery that’s playing out and all the synergies, could we decouple kind of from that normal seasonality? Or should we still have a little bit of it?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes. No, I think in the environment we’re in, we would see some of the decoupling from that normalcy and actually sequential quarter improvement, both from a revenue standpoint and a margin standpoint, particularly on the margin side given the cost actions that we’re taking. So that kind of normal kind of seasonality doesn’t necessarily hold this year given the pandemic.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Ramsey El-Assal with Barclays.

Ramsey El-Assal — Barclays — Analyst

[Technical Issues] merger revenue synergies, realization and kind of your thoughts on any challenges or opportunities coming from the impact of the pending. Sort of what are your latest thoughts on prioritization and timing of the revenue synergies realization coming out of the merger?

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes, Ramsey, we missed the first part of your question, but I think it relates to what we’re seeing from a merger synergy standpoint on the revenue side, how that’s pacing and what our expectations are as we continue to push forward. So I would say we’re very pleased with the early progress we’ve seen from a revenue synergy standpoint as evidenced at least partly today by our reiterance of our expectation of $125 million of annual run rate synergies by the time we get to three years out from the closing of the merger. We’ve launched a number of initiatives in our merchant business to realize those synergies today. Tactically, we are cross-selling our analytics and customer engagement platform now across the TSYS base of business. We’ve introduced vital plus into the Heartland channel. We’ve also brought that solution to Canada as well. We’re leveraging the capabilities of ProPay now in the Heartland business. We’re also bringing that to Canada. Those revenue synergies are well on track and pacing relatively consistent with our original expectations for them, notwithstanding, obviously, the impacts of the pandemic. There’s longer tail revenue synergies, obviously, that continue to progress as well. A number of those are really focused on our ability to cross-sell our issuing solutions into our base of existing merchant-FI relationships outside of the U.S. I would say those discussions continue to be very fruitful and are progressing.

Obviously, the pandemic has had some impact on the pace of those conversations, but we remain very optimistic and bullish as it relates to our ability to be successful in cross-selling issuer into those relationships and vice versa. We’re having a number of conversations today about new merchant relationships that could come from existing TSYS issuing FI partnerships outside of the U.S. as well. And then lastly, we’re making great headway on what we would characterize as our transaction optimization opportunities where we can better blend the capabilities of our issuing and acquiring business to deliver unique distinctive solutions to the marketplace. A lot of that focus continues to be on Europe, in markets outside of the U.S. And I think we’re reasonably optimistic that we’ll have some positive news to announce on that in the coming months. So I would say, all in all, we’re delighted with the progress we’re making. We continue to track well against those synergy targets. I’m more optimistic today than I was at the beginning of the merger as it relates to our ability to drive revenue synergies from the combination. And I would say the early success we’re seeing is very positive.

Ramsey El-Assal — Barclays — Analyst

That’s great. That’s terrific. One follow-up from me. I just wanted to ask about margins. The outperformance in the quarter was obviously great to see. Can you talk to us about the drivers of the beat this quarter and how they’ll compare to what we’re going to see next quarter? You mentioned a potential incremental margin expansion next quarter. Is this more from synergies realization? Is it just operating leverage as the business comes back online? Just any commentary on the color — on the drivers of the beat this quarter and what might be flowing in the next quarter will be helpful.

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes, sure. Ramsey, it’s Paul. I would characterize it as both better kind of optimization from the synergies. As we talked about, we raised our synergy target to $375 million. So we are seeing kind of better realization on the synergies front. We clearly achieved the $100 million of run rate cost takeouts relative to the pandemic, and so we’re seeing that benefit come through. And just in general, as we’re getting incremental revenue, the incremental margins of that revenue is coming in at a higher incremental rate than we had originally planned because we kind of locked down the expense base. So it’s really those three drivers. I would say, as it relates to fourth quarter and the margin expansion there, specifically talking about the merchant segment when I referenced kind of the expansion there, I would also say, and I mentioned this in the prepared remarks, the margin expansion we would have had this quarter would would’ve been higher had we not used some of the excess incremental revenue at the incremental margin to set aside for accrual nonexecutive bonuses. So actually, on a core fundamental basis, margin performance was actually even better than the 250 basis points that we realized.

Operator

Our next question comes from the line of Bryan Keane with Deutsche Bank.

Bryan Keane — Deutsche Bank — Analyst

I just wanted to follow up, Jeff, and asked about the M&A pipeline. There’s a lot of people trying to speculate on what deals you guys would look at. In particular, I guess, I’m trying to understand your preference between a scale, kind of a cost synergy versus looking at a growth asset that would supplement your growth rate or even take it higher. Just any thoughts on a preference between those two types of assets.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Bryan, thanks for your question. It’s Jeff. So let me just start with the criteria that we always apply to kind of every deal, and then I’ll work backwards to kind of address your question more directly. So as you said, for some time, we look at strategic fit, cultural fit and financial returns when we look at new mergers and acquisitions, very few things that we look at actually meet all three of those hurdles. And I would tell you that we vary the financial return hurdle based on risk, not surprisingly, which includes geographic and country risk and also will reflect the volatility that we see in the capital markets currently, and that may or may not persist, time will tell. As I said a minute ago, given what I just said, at current price levels, we believe, buy back our stock is really a compelling opportunity. Hence, the announcement today of the share repurchase increment authorization and a return on capital allocation, which we put on hold in March when COVID initially started. I’d also say, another corollary coming out of what I just said is most of our focus now in our pipeline, as Paul said, most of our focus now is on deals in the United States. So if you look at the criteria listed and you think about macroeconomic risk, country risk, regional risk and everything else, it shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that unless pricing environments drop, our focus is largely within the United States market, which is about 70% of the company. So that probably shouldn’t surprise anybody.

As it relates to scale versus growth assets, look, our pipeline is still with both of them. What I would tell you at the end of the day, though, is I think it’s unlikely in the immediate term that we do something outside the United States. Within the United States, we’re looking at both software assets as well as traditional processing assets. But if nothing changes from here, I would expect us to do more repurchase. You should be candid at these prices and less inorganic investment. But obviously, that’s subject to the facts. And as the facts change, our opinions will change. The other thing I want to mention in response to your question, as Paul said, is at 2.5 times net leverage and $3 billion of liquidity, we got plenty of financial firepower to do what we need to do on our own. Should we need access to additional capital and we have a use of proceeds for it, then obviously we’ll revisit the composition of our businesses. But I would say sitting here today, we think we’re particularly well capitalized to execute on our strategies. I don’t see us shedding in the assets to do that absent the distinct use of proceeds, which we don’t have today.

Bryan Keane — Deutsche Bank — Analyst

Well, that’s super helpful. And just as a quick follow-up. On the Issuer Solutions business, it seems like it’s trending well and came in kind of a little bit ahead of where we were looking for. Just thinking about the outlook there and the pipeline and issuer, if you could make some comments there.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes. Bryan, I’ll start. I’m sure Paul can contribute also, but let me just start. So I would say it’s a real bright spot, as you said, sequentially, pretty significant improvement, return to better growth in the third quarter, ex the commercial card, which is largely corporate travel related, as Paul described in his prepared remarks. Look, our pipeline is full. I think we’ve said in our prepared remarks, 11 deals in our pipeline, seven of which are competitive takeaways in the last 18 months, 33 competitive wins. So it’s hard not to look at that and be really pleased with how we’re executing. And some of these we mentioned initially, our AWS collaboration, which is unique to us, really starting to bear fruit. We’ve had our first joint win in Asia, and that’s someone going competitive takeaway from someone else from a legacy provider into a cloud-based environment coming in 2021. So now we have market validation from a customer base as to how we’re doing. And our strategy there is a little bit different than everybody else is. So if you look at our strategy in Issuer, which is bearing fruit, it’s to marry great technology with folks like AWS, to marry that with servicing the largest and most complex financial institutions globally. And the reason we go after that market base, and it’s not to the exclusion of everything else, but the reason we go after that market, that place in the market is that those are the folks who are gaining share in their own right.

So as they gain share, we gain share with them. And I don’t think you have to look further than announcements, for example, that Cap one has made and other folks over time about picking up additional portfolios to see that we’re successful when our partners are successful. So that’s why our focus is where it is. So we’re pretty optimistic in that business. Obviously, some of that depends on the macro. As I think Paul pointed out in his commentary and you look at the Visa and Mastercard numbers last night, our business was — I mean, someone can do the math, but it’s 6 times better than the market rates to growth or whatever the math was embedded in the Visa Mastercard commentary last night. So ex T&E, low single-digit growth. With T&E in there and commercial card, minus 2, whatever it was. But that compares to whatever they’ve done last time, minus 7% and minus 12% or wherever the revenue was, minus 14% and minus 17%. So clearly, I think we represent the market on issuing. And I think it goes to show the length of differentiation, the unique value play that we have the value-added services like fraud analytics and loyalty in our businesses, and that stuff, obviously, is winning. Paul, do you want to comment on that?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes, I would. I would just say this, that we are going to see continued growth there, and the recovery with that is happening in that business is very good from a top line standpoint. I would say the other thing is the efficiencies we’re getting that business to get 500 basis points of margin expansion this quarter just speaks volumes to how we’re managing the cost base in the environment we’re in. And then finally, we’re doing all that in an environment where we’re investing in modernization, as Jeff just talked about. So really kind of hitting all three levers of the business of the growth side from the top line, the new wins, the pipeline, the cost base efficiency and then investing to position the business for the future.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of David Togut with Evercore ISI.

David Togut — Evercore ISI — Analyst

Good to see the major initiatives in Europe, particularly the reestablishment of the HSBC JV and going up to 80% on la Caixa. I’m curious why move forward on both of these initiatives now. And does control of the la Caixa JV allow you to do things that you couldn’t do previously?

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes. Dave, it’s Jeff. I’ll start, and I’m sure Cameron will comment as well. So listen, those businesses are both performing really well in the current environment. I think you have to parse out the nature of our business in Europe relative to the nature of the markets themselves or in particular, Visa and Mastercard’s proxies for the market. So our business is in those markets, which is to say Western Europe or the U.K. and Spain and Portugal, have a very heavy domestic component in those markets. And our businesses are growing there absolutely on a domestic basis year-over-year, and I’m thinking about Caixa particularly, and cross border while a piece of our business is a relatively small piece of our business and is nowhere near the driver of revenue growth that you have in Visa and Mastercard. So to answer your question, from my point of view, we have fantastic partners in HSBC and Caixa. Using the networks as a proxy, we’re growing leaps and bounds ahead of where they’re growing in those markets, our ability to invest and capture more share in those businesses. Cameron talked about the bookings totals in some of our markets. We’ve had really good results in terms of new sales in those business. Businesses well in Spain, for example, we’re growing absolutely year-over-year into October on a domestic basis. So I actually think it’s a fantastic time for us to continue to invest in those businesses and support our partners.

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Yes. I agree with that, Dave. I don’t have a ton to add. I would say, I don’t think there’s ever a bad time to extend a relationship with a partner like HSBC, someone that we’ve worked with over 50 years in our business in some form or fashion. And certainly for the entirety of our existence in the U.K. market, they’re a fantastic partner. We have a number of initiatives from a digital engagement standpoint that align very well with what our strategy is in that market. And we’ve worked together extensively for years and are delighted to have the opportunity to extend our existing relationship and even broaden it into new avenues as we move forward in time. So we’re — we could not be more pleased to have executed that with them. As it relates to Spain, I completely agree with Jeff’s comments. Spain and Portugal are two of the most attractive domestic markets in Spain — or excuse me, in Europe.

As I mentioned previously, Spain returned to volume growth domestically in the quarter, and that has continued in October, even with some reintroduction of restrictions to impact or to combat the coronavirus spread. So we’re delighted with the overall performance of that business. And certainly, as Caixa continues to look to expand in Spain as well through its merger with Bankia, we think there’ll be incremental opportunities for us, and obviously owning more of the joint venture, I think, will yield better returns longer term as we think about that investment. So clearly, the valuation that underpinned and the forecast has underpinned the valuation for that business reflects the environment that we’re in today. We’re outperforming that valuation in that forecast as we sit here today. And again, any time you have an opportunity to invest further in a joint venture that’s been as successful as ours has been with Caixa in Spain, certainly, we jumped at the opportunity to do it.

David Togut — Evercore ISI — Analyst

Understood. Just as a quick follow-up, if I could. You made a number of important announcements, both in the current quarter and previously the 11 LOIs with the financial institutions globally. You’ve got the AWS partnership, the Truist win which you announced earlier this year. Can you help us dimension what this might mean for 2021 or 2022 revenue or earnings growth, recognizing companies aren’t giving guidance in this environment, but maybe give us some framework with which to think about it?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes. So David, this is Paul. I think we gave you a little bit of a framework to think about our thinking as it relates to 2021 with the adjusted earnings per share target that we have right now on our budgeting process of roughly $8. And so that’s how we’re currently thinking about next year, all of those things you just mentioned are obviously dynamics in that overall planning kind of cycle that we’re in right now. But as it relates to the next year, that’s kind of the best indicator we can give you as to our thinking of what next year might look like, assuming a much more normalized and kind of more normal operating environment.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Dave, the only thing I would add to that is just I think it gives us a lot of confidence around the momentum we have in the underlying business. The macro is the macro and the impact of the virus is what it is. And obviously, that will eventually play out. But as it relates to how we’re executing in the business, the underlying momentum we have from a new sales product and servicing standpoint, I think it just gives us a tremendous amount of confidence as to directionally where the business is heading over time. And as the macro continues the recovery, obviously, that will bear out in the financial results that we produce.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Ashwin Shirvaikar with Citi.

Ashwin Shirvaikar — Citi — Analyst

Congratulations on the quarter. Good comments here. I want to actually start with something that you guys didn’t quite dwell on your adjusted free cash flow, almost $0.5 billion, quite impressive — are there one timers in there that help? What should we look for in the full year? And any comments on this net income to free cash flow conversion going forward?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes. So Ashwin — yes, this is Paul. As it relates to — we’ve always had as our goal to kind of convert roughly 100% of adjusted earnings into free cash flow, and we were right at that goal for the third quarter. As it relates to timing, there’s been any really unique timing items in the quarter that I point to. We always have timing, things that kind of flow in and out of a quarter, but nothing that I would specifically call out. And yes, as it relates to kind of the forward look, we’ve said that kind of $1.6 billion to $2 billion run rate on a full year basis is kind of the job that we’re producing against from a free cash flow standpoint. And if you look over kind of the last three quarters, we’re playing right in that zone. And so it wouldn’t mean anything else there. We continue to obviously manage our capital expenditures in a very efficient sort of way, while still investing for growth of basic — the initiatives that we’ve talked about. But there isn’t anything from a unique kind of onetime standpoint than I would point to in the quarter.

Ashwin Shirvaikar — Citi — Analyst

Okay. Got it. So it’s very good to hear the competitive wins continue. Any commentary on the pace of converting these wins to revenues? Are financial institutions, merchants committed to promise time lines? Are they being pushed out, maybe even pull forward given sort of strategic urgency? Any commentary on that, that can have implications for the future?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes, Ashwin, there isn’t anything really from an overall standpoint that I would say is changing the pace of patent realization of those opportunities. Obviously, each client might have a different dynamic just always — that always happens when you’re dealing with clients. But there is one theme or any kind of a particular dynamic at play of either speeding up or slowing down kind of the normalized kind of realization of being able to get those opportunities converted into revenue. I would say, from a conversion standpoint, particularly on the issuing side, which has the longest kind of cycle to bring those, our conversion pipeline is relatively full. And so new opportunities are kind of being paced into that pipeline with that full nature. But there isn’t any unique dynamic at play around acceleration or delaying of those opportunities.

Ashwin Shirvaikar — Citi — Analyst

And that would transl And that would translate to good visibility, I would imagine. ate to good visibility, I would imagine.

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes.

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Jason Kupferberg with Bank of America.

Jason Kupferberg — Bank of America — Analyst

I thought I’d just follow-up on the comment around the targeting $8 of EPS for next year. I know you said that assumes a more normalized macro environment, but I was hoping maybe you could outline just a little bit more about some of the expectations that are embedded behind that target. For example, would you have the flexibility to drive even more cost takeout if necessary to get there? Does it also assume some meaningful amount of capital deployment?

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Yes. So Jason, obviously, we’re in this budget process right now, and we obviously have always got a lot of dynamics at play when we’re in a budgeting process that kind of plays through various scenarios of what the revenue picture looks like and then what the cost side looks like. And yes, we have, obviously, one set of plans as it relates to our cost initiatives. And then under a different set of revenue assumptions, we would have a different set of plans. Do we have additional cost opportunities? The answer to that is yes, there’s always this balancing of the realization of cost opportunities with what that does on the revenue side. And all of this is kind of wrapped in the overall environment that we’re operating in. And we’re going to need the next, obviously, several months to kind of play itself out relative to the overall operating environment, and we’ll seek the cost base relative to that operating environment. But yes, I mean, I wouldn’t give you any more color really than that other than the state that we are in our budgeting cycle, and we play through all those dynamics in every year. This is a more unique year, obviously, given the pandemic and the dynamics that play with the pandemic.

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Jason, this is Cameron. The only thing I would add to that is it obviously assumes that the path run as it relates to recovery continues. And certainly, it doesn’t anticipate a meaningful retrenchment, particularly as it relates to shutdowns or significant restrictions around commerce that we saw, obviously, earlier this year. So it’s not assuming heroic pace of recovery. It sort of assumes we’re continuing on the pace we’re on today.

Jason Kupferberg — Bank of America — Analyst

Okay. Okay. And just a follow-up on M&A. I mean, I think, historically, you guys have been pretty clear that acquisitions need to be at least breakeven, but more likely accretive to year one adjusted EPS. So is that still the case? And would you do a deal that actually dilutes your organic revenue growth even if it gives you a lot of year one EPS accretion?

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes. It’s Jeff. Jason, the answer is no, we will not do that. So we’re very focused on our long-term model that we rearticulated and reaffirmed at the time of our partnership with TSYS about 1.5 years ago now. So no, I don’t see us doing deals that are dilutive to the rate of organic revenue growth. It doesn’t make any sense to push a boulder up a further hill. I think we’ve invested very substantially to get our business to be 60% technology-enabled. We’re very pleased with the success of that strategy. You see in there, differentiated results, which are multiples better than networks last night. I don’t see us going backwards on that.

Operator

Your final question comes from the line of Andrew Jeffrey with Truist Securities.

Andrew Jeffrey — Truist Securities — Analyst

Appreciate you — excuse me, at the end here. Jeff, you’ve spent a lot of time talking about your software technology-enabled businesses, which I think is a key differentiator. I wonder if you could drill down a little bit in the hospitality, where it seems like there’s a tremendous amount of tech change, whether it’s delivery, order ahead with the QR code. You made a couple of comments about Xenial, including the integration of Genius. I just wonder if you could maybe flesh out a little bit volume growth in that vertical, share gains from whom you’re taking share, where you think your competitive advantage is, etc.

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes. I’ll start, Andrew, and I’m sure Cameron will comment as well. So listen, we’re very pleased with our Xenial business. As you referenced, we gave additional disclosure today about how that business is performing. We did $62 million, I think, online orders as well as $1 billion of volume coming out of that business in the most recent period. I think Cameron commented on 30% increase in SaaS sales in that business in the most recent quarter. So he can give you more detail, but we’re very pleased about where that business is. But if you step back for a second, you tie us back the overall competitive landscape. I don’t think there’s anybody who’s got the full stack of vertical capabilities that we do in that business. Our pipeline today, Andrew, is filled with cross-sells in that business. So we mentioned Dutch Bros, we mentioned Long John Silver’s today, in previous calls. We’ve mentioned RBI with Burger King, Popeyes, etc. We’ve mentioned NENs and the folks that inspire our focused brands.

So we’ve got enormous pipeline in that business. I would say it has changed a little bit, and this is very good news for us and valuation of our strategy is that in the last six months or so, we’ve been getting a lot of RFPs from either folks who are never customers of ours or exchange in that pipeline. And I think that’s because they see what we’re seeing, which is we call it the restaurant of the future, the QSR of the future, which obviously now includes safer commerce. But looking to RFP, their payments business, and these are businesses that are not with us today with competitors who are primarily rightful shop payments companies. They look at RFP, their payments businesses, and they’re coming to us, and I’m sure others and saying, can you do that while you’re doing everything else that we need the QSR level, including safer commerce. And I think that go-to-market with us, Andrew, is distinctive and unique to us. And that includes both competitive takeaways being brand-new brands, and we have 26 of the top 50 a day, but we don’t have all of them. So it includes brand-new brands, but also includes guys who are customers of us just for a portion of their business. So I think that cross-sell strategy is really working, and we’re very fortunate to be in that position we’re in. Cameron, do you want to talk a little bit about some of the sub detail?

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Sure. And I’ll be happy to. I think, Bryan it’s important to segment the market as we always do here, particularly in restaurant, maybe more than other vertical markets. So at the enterprise end, Jeff I think described well, how we’re positioned with Xenial and the success we’re seeing with Xenial. I will comment, obviously, that the integration with Cayan really opens up the avenue for cross-selling payments into that channel. I think as you know, SICOM, the legacy business we acquired a couple of years ago, had no real payment volume in that business. And by integrating Cayan in we’re opening up a significant new avenue for payment cross-sell, which is obviously consistent with our overarching strategy. As we move down market into the mid-market channel, which we really attack through the Heartland business, we’re delighted with the success we’re seeing with our Heartland restaurant solution. That is geared toward what I would characterize as the restaurant mid-market channel. Sales of that were up 26% sequentially from Q2, 20% year-over-year. We’re continuing to see significant uptake of our software as a solution — software as a service solutions through the point-of-sale system in that channel and could not be more pleased with the progress in the mid-market.

And then lastly, in the small end of the market, we introduced our omnichannel version of our registered product in this quarter, which we sell into the small end of the restaurant as well as small end at just the merchant base more broadly. We’re seeing uptake of that being particularly good as we integrate our online ordering capabilities into our traditional point-of-sale software solution for the small end of the market. So I think we have better product, better capability, better solutions across the spectrum of the restaurant vertical across all segments of that market. And I think as a result of that, we continue to win and we continue to take share in that channel.

Andrew Jeffrey — Truist Securities — Analyst

All right. That’s helpful color. And then one quick follow-up on the Issuer business. You mentioned a number of competitive wins. Could you just discuss — are those takeaways from existing vendors or internal flips?

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Yes, they’re largely the former, Andrew. We said that they will be we announced with our script this morning. So Scotiabank in Canada was an in-sourcing model. So that actually is conversion in-sourcing and outsourcing. So that’s a flip from in and out. But other than that, as I mentioned in the prepared remarks, seven of the 11 are competitive takeaways from existing providers. And the new one with AWS in Asia is also a takeaway from a legacy incumbent. So the vast majority are takeaways, but Scotiabank will be the exception. On behalf of Global Payments, thank you very much for joining us this morning.

Operator

[Operator Closing Remarks]

Duration: 63 minutes

Call participants:

Winnie Smith — Senior Vice President, Investor Relations

Jeff Sloan — Chief Executive Officer

Paul Todd — Senior Executive Vice President And Chief Financial Officer

Cameron Bready — President And Chief Operating Officer

Darrin Peller — Wolfe Research — Analyst

Dave Koning — Baird — Analyst

Ramsey El-Assal — Barclays — Analyst

Bryan Keane — Deutsche Bank — Analyst

David Togut — Evercore ISI — Analyst

Ashwin Shirvaikar — Citi — Analyst

Jason Kupferberg — Bank of America — Analyst

Andrew Jeffrey — Truist Securities — Analyst

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The Brink's Company (BCO) CEO Doug Pertz on Q3 2020 Results - Earnings Call Transcript
Oct 30 2020
The Brink’s Company (BCO) CEO Doug Pertz on Q3 2020 Results – Earnings Call Transcript

The Brink’s Company (NYSE:BCO) Q3 2020 Earnings Conference Call October 29, 2020 8:30 AM ET

Company Participants

Ed Cunningham – Vice President-Investor Relations and Corporate Communications

Doug Pertz – Chief Executive Officer

Ron Domanico – Chief Financial Officer

Conference Call Participants

George Tong – Goldman Sachs

Jasper Bibb – Truist Securities

Jeff Kessler – Imperial Capital

Sam England – Berenberg Capital Markets

Operator

Welcome to The Brink’s Company’s Third Quarter 2020 Earnings Call. Brink’s issued a press release on third quarter results this morning. The company also filed an 8-K that includes the release and the slides that will be used in today’s call. For those of you listening by phone, the release and slides are available in the Investor Relations section of the Company’s website brinks.com. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

Now, for the Company’s Safe Harbor statement. This call and the Q&A Session will contain forward-looking statements. Actual results could differ materially from projected or estimated results. Information regarding factors that could cause such differences is available in today’s press release and in the Company’s most recent SEC filings. Information presented and discussed on this call is representative as of today only. Brink’s assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. The call is copyrighted and may not be used without written permission from Brink’s.

It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Ed Cunningham, Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Mr. Cunningham, you may begin.

Ed Cunningham

Thanks, Sarah, and good morning, everyone. Joining me today, our CEO, Doug Pertz; and our CFO, Ron Domanico. This morning, we reported third quarter results on both the GAAP and the non-GAAP basis. The non-GAAP results exclude a number of items, including our Venezuela operations, the impact of Argentina’s highly inflationary accounting, reorganization and restructuring costs, items related to acquisitions and dispositions, costs related to an internal loss and costs related to certain accounting compliance matters.

We are also providing our results on both a constant currency and pro forma basis. Constant currency eliminates changes in foreign currency exchange rates from the prior year and pro forma revenue includes this year’s G4S acquisitions as if they’ve been part of Brink’s in both 2019 and 2020. We believe the non-GAAP results make it easier for investors to assess operating performance between periods. Accordingly, our comments today, will focus primarily on the non-GAAP results.

Reconciliations of results are provided in the press release and the appendix to the slides we’re using today and in this morning’s 8-K filing, all of which can be found on our website.

I’ll now turn the call over to Doug. Doug?

Doug Pertz

Thank you, Ed. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for joining us today. On behalf of all of us at Brink’s, I offer our best wishes to all of you and your families during these difficult times.

The strong third quarter performance we you reported this morning, is a result of outstanding execution by all of our global management team, which has been sharply focused on three priorities since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic starting with the health and safety of our employees and their families. And I want to personally thank all of our people for their dedication for providing our services, which are so essential to customers and economies around the world.

Our results reflect the team’s successful execution of our second priority as well, which is to preserve our financial strength and reduce costs in line with the short-term revenue declines we experienced in the second quarter. We’ve made great progress in right-sizing our business without sacrificing service levels and qualities to our customers that they expect.

Our third priority is to position Brink’s to be stronger and more profitable on the other side of this pandemic. This priority is focused on permanent cost reductions that have combined with a successful integration with the G4S acquisition and the initial rollout of our Strategy 2.0 have positioned us to continue to deliver long-term value to all of our stakeholders.

We believe that our revenue recover — that as our revenue recovers and surpasses 2019 levels, our realigned cost structure will provide the operating leverage to drive up margin rates and margin dollars to new and higher levels in 2021 and beyond. Our performance since the onset of the pandemic in March, including our strong third quarter results and our expectation of even stronger finish to this fourth quarter, it is a testament to the disciplined execution on these priorities, and as important to the resilience of our business.

Turning now to Slide 4. Our strong third quarter results were driven by continued revenue recovery from our April lows, significant cost reductions and the successful integration of the G4S acquisition to date. Results include a reported revenue increase of 5% or 11% on a constant currency basis, driven by a revenue recovery in September to 90% of year ago level and the addition to the G4S cash business.

Operating profit of $100 million, reflecting a margin rate of 10.3% in the quarter. Adjusted EBITDA of $147 million and EPS of $0.86 per share. Given the ongoing impact of the pandemic, our sequential results are a good gauge of the progress we’re making. Compared to our strong second quarter results, our third quarter revenue was up 17% and operating margin — operating profit grew by 36%. These results clearly demonstrate the impact of our realigned cost structure, coupled with our revenue recovery.

Our results together with publicly available information on cash and cash data demonstrate the resilience of cash and our business in general. The strong revenue recovery in the third quarter to 88% of 2019 pro forma levels and the 78% in the second quarter is very encouraging given the retail shutdowns and overall economic weakness caused by the pandemic.

Since April, we’ve seen steady monthly increases in the number of retail customers and customer locations that are reopening and we’re processing more cash per location, both in terms of volume, of notes and total value. Our total cash process in the U.S. is also up significantly from pre-pandemic levels. And independent data suggests that cash as a percent of payments has not materially changed from 2019 levels.

Looking ahead, we expect continued improvement in the fourth quarter as ongoing cost reductions, organic revenue growth and additional contributions from the G4S acquisition drive operating profit and margin rates higher. As a result, we’ve reinstated 2020 guidance that exceeds the top end of the model we disclosed with second quarter results, with respective — with midpoint operating profit and EPS of $348 million and $3 per share, respectively. This guidance is supported by a fourth quarter operating margin target of approximately 11.5%, which we see as a strong jumping off point for 2021, when the full year benefits of permanent cost reduction realignment and the G4S acquisition are expected to supplement the continued revenue recovery. Slide 5 provides a more complete summary of our sequential results thus far in 2020.

As I mentioned, we believe the second quarter results were very strong, especially when you consider that the initial and most damaging effects of the pandemic were occurred in April and May. Our third quarter results were even stronger and they underscore the impact of increased operating leverage as operating profit grew by 36%, more than double revenue growth of 17%, reflecting a margin increase of 140 basis points to 10.3%. The revenue increase was driven mostly by organic growth with some additional revenue from the G4S acquisition. Adjusted EBITDA was up 17% to $147 million and EPS was increased by 21% to $0.86 per share.

Turning to Slide 6. This slide provides more detail on the revenue recovery rates across a variety of our global markets. After hitting a low point in April, almost all of our markets experienced strong recoveries in June, as economies around the globe began to reopen and most continues to recover in the third quarter, although at a slower rate than in June.

The U.S. revenue, as you can see on the left hand side of the chart, recovered in the third quarter to about 91% of 2019 levels, up from 81% in the second quarter — excuse me, up from 80% in the second quarter as it shows on the chart. U.S operating profit margin was up as well, up a 160 basis points compared to the 2019 third quarter and this is even as revenue was 9% lower in 2020 versus 2019. The right side of the chart shows that on a pro forma basis, which includes both Brink’s and G4S results for 2019 and 2020, our total third quarter revenue was about 88% of 2019. Again, up from 78% in the second quarter and 71% in April.

Revenue recovery continued in the third quarter, although at a lower recovery rate with September pro forma revenue at about 90% of 2019. While we’re encouraged by the recovery rates, given the fluctuating impact of the pandemic on economies around the world, predicting future revenue levels is at best difficult. As a result, the low end of our 2020 guidance assumes a revenue recovery rate of about 85% in the fourth quarter to accommodate a potential further deterioration in the external environment.

I’ll now turn it over to Ron for his financial review. Ron?

Ron Domanico

Thanks, Doug, and good day, everyone. Doug reviewed our sequential third quarter results versus our second quarter results. I’ll now review our third quarter results versus the third quarter last year. Before I do, please remember that we disclosed acquisition separately for the first 12 months of ownership at which time they are mostly integrated. And then they were included in our organic results.

In the third quarter 2020, acquisitions include for the entire quarter G4Si and the G4S cash businesses that we purchased in the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, Romania, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Malaysia, Hong Kong, the Philippines and the Dominican Republic. During the third quarter, we acquired G4S cash businesses in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, in Indonesia, and those results were included from the month of acquisition. Acquisitions in the third quarter also include TVS in Columbia and exclude the impact of the divestiture of a small monitoring business in France.

Looking at Slide 11. 2020 third quarter revenue and constant currency was up 11% as the pandemic related 9% organic decline was more than offset by a 20% contribution from acquisitions. Negative ForEx reduced revenue by $56 million or 6%, was driven by the pandemic induced flight to the U.S dollar.

Sequentially, on average exchange rates improved slightly during the third quarter. Reported revenue was $971 million, up 5% versus the third quarter last year. Third quarter operating profit was up 19% in constant currency as acquisitions more than offset a 1% decline in our organic results, significantly improved from the second quarter organic decline of 18%.The fact that the percent organic operating profit decline was much better than the percent organic revenue decline is a testament to our proactive cost realignment.

Negative ForEx reduced OP by $22 million or minus 22%. This included a $10 million charge on the conversion of Argentine pesos to U.S dollars, using the chip swap markets. Reported operating profits for the quarter was $100 million and the operating margin was 10.3%, down 80 bps from the third quarter 2019, but up 30 bps if you adjust for the Argentine conversion.

Segment results are included in the appendix and in our press release and later today in the 10-Q. Corporate expense in the third quarter was $2 million unfavorable versus 2019 driven by negative ForEx, primarily the $10 million Argentine peso conversion costs and higher bonus accruals partly offset by bad debt and reduced expenses for IT, professional fees and travel.

Our reported results include more than $4 million in incremental expenses in the third quarter for personal protective equipment, additional cleaning and other measures to keep our employees and our customers safe.

Moving to Slide 8. Third quarter interest expense was $27 million, up $5 million versus the same period last year as higher debt associated with acquisitions was partly offset by lower variable interest rates. Tax expense in the quarter was $24 million, $1 million better than last year as lower income was mostly offset by a higher projected effective tax rate.

During the quarter, we revised our estimated full year ETR down to 34.1% from 37.5% in the second quarter, reflecting our expectation of higher earnings. Effective tax rate volatility is due to changes in assumptions about our ability to utilize tax attributes at varying projected income levels. The G4S acquisition has been constructive in moderating the ETR.

$100 million of third quarter 2020 operating profits was reduced by $27 million in interest, $24 million in taxes and $6 million in minority interest and other, to generate $43 million of income from continuing operations. Dividing this by50.6 million weighted average diluted shares outstanding generated $0.86 of earnings per share versus a $1.05 in 2019.

Our EPS comparison was negatively impacted versus 2019 by about $0.15 from the Argentine peso conversion and $0.04 due to the higher ETR. Our EPS comparison was positively impacted versus 2019 by $0.01 from the third quarter 1.1 million share purchase, which reduced our outstanding shares by about 2%.

In the third quarter, depreciation and amortization was $44 million, interest expense and taxes were $51 million and non-cash share-based compensation was $9 million. In total, 2020 third quarter adjusted EBITDA was $147 million, up 1% versus 2019.

Slide 9 summarizes the four metrics I just reviewed. Revenue, operating profit, adjusted EBITDA and EPS. This is a format that we’ve used repeatedly and is included here for reference.

Turning to Slide 10. As we discussed last quarter, as soon as it became apparent that COVID-19 was virulent, we took immediate action to put measures in place to reduce direct labor hours at the same time into at least the same magnitude as revenue decreased. We also took decisive action to reduce our fixed costs, so that we could generate similar or greater absolute levels of profitability if the pandemic caused a permanent 10% reduction in revenue. We did this while maintaining the capability to serve our customers when volume levels return.

On the left side of the slide are listed some of the actions that we’ve taken to address both our variable and our fixed costs. The right side illustrates that our cost realignment actions are expected to reduce headcount by approximately 6,500, 1,000 more than our estimate last quarter. We now expect approximately $70 million in 2020 costs associated with these actions, and we anticipate about $90 million in ongoing annualized savings, each up $5 million versus our projection Last quarter.

We estimate that over half of our cost reductions are permanent and will generate positive operating leverage as revenue levels continue to recover. We continuously monitor and utilize government programs around the world, and we’re able to offset a portion of our labor costs in certain countries. However, these programs are diminishing and the benefit was material less — materially less in the third quarter compared to the second quarter.

Now let’s look at CapEx on Slide 11. Our original guidance for 2020 cash CapEx was $165 million, which included $140 million for operating CapEx and $25 million to purchase cash devices. At the start of the crisis, we rationalized CapEx to only purchase assets that are essential to our business operations, safety, and security.

We cut the legacy Brink’s cash CapEx targets by more than 50%, down to $80 million.

We also expect to spend an additional $20 million related to the G4S acquisition, bringing our total cash CapEx target for this year to $100 million. Year-to-date, we’ve invested $79 million. Due to the catch-up CapEx, we invested since 2017 and the implementation of our Strategy 2.0 initiatives that require less capital investment, we expect our new normal maintenance CapEx level to be down to about 4% of revenue.

Turning the cash flow on Slide 12. Cash flow from operating activities is comprised of adjusted EBITDA reduced by changes in working capital, cash restructuring, cash interest and cash taxes. Cash flow from operating activities, less cash capital expenditures equals free cash flow. In 2019, adjusted EBITDA was $564 million, cash flow from operating activities was $334 million and subtracting the $165 million in cash CapEx resulted in $169 million of free cash flow.

We have reinstated 2020 full year guidance, and as Doug will review with you shortly, we estimate that annual adjusted EBITDA of $520 million to $535 million this year. We expect working capital to be negatively impacted by pandemic related increases in DSO receivables collection. And we have a high cash restructuring charges related to both the G4S acquisition and our Priority 3 cost realignment actions. Together, they should consume $140 million to $160 million in cash this year.

Cash taxes, which totaled only $24 million in 2019 are estimated at $65 million this year. We received significant tax refunds last year, which are not expected to repeat at the same level this year. We anticipate cash interest to be around $95 million due to the incremental debt associated with the G4S acquisition. Cash CapEx, as we just reviewed is targeted at a $100 million.

All-in, 2020 free cash flow should be in a range of a $100 million to $135 million, up materially from the $40 million to $110 million we modeled last quarter. And as noted previously, during the third quarter, we used $50 million of cash on hand to repurchase and retire approximately 1.1 million shares.

Let’s move to Slide 13 to review our debt, liquidity and covenant headroom. The bars on this chart represent the source of our liquidity. The cash available in our business and the capacity in our revolving credit facility. At the top of each bar, you can see our cash. Below the cash is our credit facility available and drawn and below that our debt and financial leases. The bars each represent a point in time at 2019 year end at September 30, 2020 and at December 31, 2020 pro forma for the completion of the G4S cash acquisitions.

At the end of last year, we had approximately $1.2 billion in liquidity. On April 1, we closed the $590 million expansion of the term loan A with our bank group. And on June 22, we issued $400 million in new 5-year senior unsecured notes. Year-to-date, we use most of those proceeds to complete approximately 90% of the G4S acquisition and the balance increased liquidity to $1.5 billion on September 30.

We expect that free cash flow in the fourth quarter will exceed the cash necessary to complete the remaining G4S acquisitions and liquidity should remain around $1.5 billion at year-end. Other than the 5% annual amortization of our term loan A, we have no significant debt maturities before 2024.

Our variable interest rate, including the expanded term loan A, increased 25 bps in September to L plus 200, reflecting the increased financial leverage associated with the pandemic related EBITDA reduction and the increased borrowings related to the G4S acquisition. On June 9, we amended our bank agreement through February 2024 to replace the total debt leverage covenant with a secured debt leverage covenant.

The 2020 max, the new covenant is 4.25x and our September 30 pro forma secured leverage ratio was 2.0x. We don’t anticipate approaching our covenant limits at anytime in the foreseeable future. We plan to maintain our quarterly dividends. Our credit rating remains strong and we have the capacity to weather the pandemic even if conditions worsen.

Let’s look at our net debt and leverage on Slide 14. This slide illustrates our actual net debt and financial leverage at year end 2018, 2019 and at September 30 this year. The fourth bar on each side estimates our net debt and financial leverage at this year end. Our net debt at the end of the third quarter was $1.95 billion. That was up about $600 million over year end 2019 due primarily to the G4S acquisition. At September 30, 2020 our total leverage ratio was 3.7x, and as I just mentioned, our fully synergized and secured leverage ratio was 2.0x.

With that, I’ll hand it back over to Doug.

Doug Pertz

Thanks, Ron. Slide 15 give some much needed perspective on e-commerce as it relates to the U.S. retail market. As the global market leader in cash management, we fully acknowledge that the pandemic has accelerated the adoption of e-commerce, forward at least several years. However, if you step back and look at the big picture, studies suggest that the overwhelming majority of retail revenue more than 80% will continue to be generated from in-person sales.

According to a U.S Census Bureau — according to the U.S Census Bureau, total retail sales in 2019 were approximately $5.5 trillion. And of that 89% was transacted in-person with e-commerce accounting for about 11% of total sales. E-commerce’s growth this year is estimated to be around 35% to about 15% of total retail this year, which means 85% of retail sales will still be in-person.

In fact, according to the industry experts given even as e-commerce sales continue to grow by 2022, the share of in-person retail sales will remain well over 80% of total retail sales. Given, that in the second quarter during the height of the shutdowns, Walmart reported a 97% growth in e-commerce sales. However, e-commerce sales at Walmart still represented a little over 11% of their total revenue.

Similarly, Target’s e-commerce sales grew an impressive 195%, but still represented only a little over less 17% of Target’s total sales. This means that 83% of Target sales were in-store. And in fact in-store sales were up 11.5% in the second quarter year-over-year. These results are very consistent with the overall retail sales data shown on the table at the top of the slide.

In short, speculation that we’re becoming a cashless society, only considered some of the facts. And as you’ll see in the next slide, we’re actually seeing a higher levels of cash in the U.S retail business. And we believe that the in-person retail opportunity will continue to grow over the next several years.

Slide 16 represents data supporting our assertion that cash as a percent of total payment methods in recent months has effectively remained at or close to pre-pandemic levels in the U.S. And the data is from a combination of external sources and internal metrics. Starting at the top left, labeled one, based on a regular annual statistically significant survey by the Fed, cash has — cash was the most preferred form of in-person payment at 35% of all transactions ahead of credit cards, debit cards and other forms of payment.

Moving to the left part of the slide, labeled two, the Fed also issued special — a special COVID-19 report, which examined consumer payment behavior in April and May of this year during the height of the nationwide lockdowns. Notably, the Fed study reported that people were using cash at similar rates to pre-pandemic levels for in-person purchases. And that 90% of those surveyed said that cash was accepted at retailers they visited.

The data at the top right of the slide, Number 3, reflects a survey of Square Inc.’s sellers and is perhaps the most telling confirmation of the staying power of cash. Square has publicly stated that since the onset of the pandemic, cash as a percent of sellers payments remains in the mid 30% range, consistent with the Fed’s pre-pandemic level. While the Square survey indicated that cash as a percentage of all of its payments — all of its sellers transactions declined from the pre-pandemic level of 37%. It still remained at the 33% level in both April and in August.

The Square’s survey also notes that 85% of its sellers intend to continue accepting cash over the long-term future, which is actually an increase over their 2019 survey results. To compliment the Square and the Fed Data, Number 4 on the bottom right of the slide represents internal Brink’s analysis of cash levels we’re seeing at our U.S retail consumers — customers.

The gray bar on this chart shows that our retail customers were reopening at a steady pace throughout the second and third quarters resulting in over 90% of the locations reopened in September. Importantly, over the same period, the blue and the yellow bars indicate that we’re processing more cash per retail location in the U.S than at pre — at the pre-COVID baseline. This supports the premise that cash has a percent of payment methods remains largely unchanged and supported — and is supported by other independent sources.

This is strong support for the resiliency of cash and the solid future of our business even during the pandemic as evidenced by first — Brink’s is picking up and processing more cash in the U.S today than before the pandemic. And the cash as a percent of payments has not meaningfully changed in 2021 and also the U.S. cash in circulation is at a record level, up around 10% since March.

Moving to Slide 17. This slide summarizes our strat plan — our strategic plan two, which is a continuation of our first strategic plan that we call SP1. As our new 2.0 initiatives are layered on top of the 1.0 organic growth initiatives and our 1.0 acquisition initiatives, both of which were successfully executed in SP1. Together, they form a strong foundation for continued growth.

From 2017 through 2019, our SP1 plan period, these initiatives added $75 million of operating profit via 1.0 organic improvements. And another $100 million from the $1.1 billion invested in 13 acquisitions. This year’s G4S acquisition brought our total to — total 1.5 strategy investments to $1.9 billion. Our SP1 initiatives drove a 27% increase in revenue with an average annual organic revenue growth of 7%. We improved operating profit by 81%, equating to a 22% compounded annual growth rate over the 3-year period through 2019.

Adjusted EBITDA grew by 67% — 65%, excuse me, over this time and EPS grew by 71% or 19% compounded over annual growth rate. The Brink’s team has a solid track record of execution. And despite the pandemic we expect to continue to build on this track record throughout SP2.

In SP2, our original 1.0 initiatives become 1.0 wider and deeper, which stands for — which is — WD, which stands for wider and deeper. During the first 3 years, the 1.0 initiatives were heavily focused on the U.S. and Mexico. We are extending these improvements throughout the 50 additional countries in our global footprint. And we’ll continue to drive operational excellence and cost improvements.

Additionally, during the pandemic, we have restructured and resized our business with a key focus on permanently reducing fixed costs, which we expect will lead to higher operating leverage and higher margins. In SP2, our 1.5 initiatives include the addition of G4S this year, which adds 14 new markets to our global footprint, including very desirable cash intensive markets in Eastern Europe and in Asia.

And the top bar represents a new third layer to SP2, which we call Strategy 2.0. 2.0 is designed to expand our presence in the global cash ecosystem and provides a path to digital payments. Our initial focus today is on Strategy 2.1, which rolls out our Brink’s Complete solution.

Turning to Slide 18. Strategy 2.0 — excuse me, Strategy 2.1 specifically refers to our new Brink’s Complete service. We developed this service with unvented and underserved retailers in mind, and we’re also introducing it to our current customer base. For years, the cash management industry has drifted toward commoditization, relying on efficiency gains throughout density to compete heavily on price and to increase our margins. Simply put, the industry including Brink’s has not made cash management easy to use or provided a complete cash management solution to our customers.

To illustrate this unfilled need and opportunity, I’ll use again the Square example. Square’s customers state that 33% of their total payments are in cash, yet Square service is designed to handle other forms of payment, but not cash. In the U.S., Brink’s Complete is the right cash management service for retailers, both large and small.

Brink’s Complete is a subscription base, fully developed digital cash management solution. The service consists of a digital app, a low cost tech enabled safe for cash deposits tailored to the needs of each business. And most importantly, it provides next day credit for cash deposited into the device. We believe Brink’s Complete is an ideal solution for a large portion of the Brink’s existing customers and retail market that currently doesn’t use any cash management services. This includes large retail chains that currently walk cash to local banks and to SMB Square sellers discussed above in the survey.

While the pandemic has slowed the rollout and retailers engagements with Brink’s Complete, today — to date, we have agreements for about 2,500 devices to our current customer locations. And in the last quarter, we’ve gained traction on our sales efforts with the large underserved retailers. And we now have initial pilots with 6 nationally branded retailers that together operate over 50,000 locations.

We believe Brink’s Complete offers compelling benefits that will transform the way retailers manage their cash, similar to how they handle their other payment methods. The pandemic has certainly slowed us down on the rollout, but we’re accelerating the launch and remain convinced that Brink’s Complete has the potential to accelerate organic growth and increased margin in the years to come.

Turning now to Slide 19. It shows our actual revenue recovery rate and strong operating margin growth for the first three quarters of this year, as well as our guidance for the fourth quarter and full-year. The steady upward margin progression on the right side clearly demonstrates the impact of our costs realignment this year with a focus on permanent fixed cost reductions. And we’re targeting a margin rate of over 11.5% in the fourth quarter, a sequential improvement of at least 120 basis points and a great jumping off point most importantly for as we enter 2021.

As I mentioned earlier, there continues to be much uncertainty related to the potential impact of the pandemic and political changes that could affect the pace and magnitude of our revenue recovery. Therefore, our full year 2020 guidance is based on a range of recovery rates, including about 85% in the fourth quarter at the low end.

Slide 20 offers us an approach from modeling non-GAAP operating profit based on potential 2021 revenue as a percent of 2019 pro forma revenue. On the right side, our model uses a revenue range of 90% to 110% for 2019 revenue. Our third quarter results are already close to the 90% recovery mark with September revenue at 90% of 2019.

So with the low end of the range to 2021 model resolves in OP income, OP profit of $425 million, or EBITDA of $615 million. At the 110% range revenue range OP profit rises to $615 million, EBITDA of over $800 million demonstrating improved margin driven by operating leverage. At the midpoint, assuming recovery to a 100% of 2019 revenue next year and with an expected operating margin of 11.5%, which is approximately a 100 basis points above 2019 margin, we expect to generate a profit of $550 and million and EBITDA of over $700 million.

The chart on the left shows, what’s driving the margin improvement. At 100% of 2019 revenue, we expect cost actions in the G4S synergies to more than offset the projected unfavorable FX impact of approximately 170 basis points of margin, yielding the 90 basis points of margin rate improvement. Variable cost will adjust upward as revenue recovers, but we expect our Priority 3 fixed cost reductions to be more permanent, driving incremental operating leverage in 2021 and beyond. Hence our estimate that 110% of 2019 revenue, margins would improve another 100 basis points to 12.5%.

It’s important to note that this model does not include any benefits related to our Strategy 2.0 initiatives, which is successful would provide incremental revenue and margin growth in 2021 and beyond.

In summary, we’re very encouraged by our third quarter results, the positive margin impact on our cost — of our cost actions and the strong revenue recovery that demonstrates the resiliency of our business. We’re also encouraged by the fact that support — by the facts that support the continued strong use of cash as a primary method payment at similar to pre-pandemic levels, and the increased level of cash we’re processing and in circulation in the U.S.

We expect the G4S cash acquisition to be completed by the end of this year and full synergies is realized and strong earnings contribution in 2021. We expect to have a strong finish to the fourth quarter. And as a result, we’ve reinstated our full year 2020 guidance to a level that exceeds the high end of the model we provided in the second quarter earnings, including adjusted EBITDA that is now expected to be in the $520 million to $535 million range.

I’m highly confident that Brink’s will emerge from the current crisis as a stronger company with substantial opportunities for growth in revenue, operating profit, adjusted EBITDA, earnings and cash flow. Our confidence is supported by our strong balance sheet, ample liquidity, our expanded global footprint, our realigned cost structure and a compelling strategic plan to expand our presence in the cash ecosystem with tech enabled services like Brink’s Complete.

We look forward to reporting 2021 results that we believe will reflect the benefits of a full year’s contribution to the G4S acquisition and related synergies, continued revenue recovery rates and a full year of margin growth driven by realigned cross structure.

Sarah, let’s now open it up for questions.

Question-and-Answer Session

Thank you. [Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from George Tong with Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.

Q – George Tong

Hi. Thanks. Good morning.

Doug Pertz

Good morning, George.

George Tong

Organic revenue trends continued to improve in the third quarter. Can you discuss how organic revenue is performed on a monthly basis moving through the quarter and exiting the quarter? And what organic revenue ranges are incorporated into your full year guidance?

Doug Pertz

Yes, it varies by country and on a global basis. But in general, as we stated that certainly in the second quarter, as we saw June was by far the highest slope in terms of revenue recovery. But during — in general, the full month quarter of third quarter we continue to see a monthly improvement during the quarter. And hence, that’s why you see the jumping off point from September into the fourth quarter being at the highest level in comparison to the average for the full quarter, which suggests that the slope is still positive in terms of the recovery for revenue recovery in general. And the U.S. is an indication of that as an example. But it is a substantially lower growth rate or acceleration rate versus the second quarter. So we continue to see that.

And I think, George, what we — what we’re stating in here and which leads to the second part of your question is we really don’t know what will happen during the third quarter in terms of revenue. But based on what we’ve seen, based on forecast, based on what is open and what we’ve seen not only in the third quarter, but as you say, as we exit the third quarter that we see the range of revenues that we’ve laid out in our guidance. And that ranges from somewhere in the 85.5% to 86% range of revenue to the low 90s. And again, jumping off point in September was 90% and the U.S was at approximately 91%. So we think that’s a realistic range. Who knows, again, what will happen in these times. But we think that’s a realistic range based on our jumping off point, what we’ve seen to date. And it gives us a little bit of downside protection in the quarter for the revenue growth.

George Tong

Got it. That’s helpful. And stepping back, can you talk about how customer demand for services might be affected by the resurgence of COVID cases. And specifically if you’re seeing any change in the number of pickup and drop offs.

Doug Pertz

Well, I mean, obviously it’s too early to tell. Most of the — most recent changes that you’ve seen on media, and obviously, that has seemed to have had an impact on the markets over the last couple of weeks are fairly recent. The shutdowns that we’ve heard about during the — if you want to call the second wave, have been heavily focused on shutting down restaurants and bars and other areas such as gyms and places where people gather. We’ve not seen as much of a focus as was the case in the May timeframe, April-May timeframe, the first shutdown and we haven’t seen as much focus on shutting down retail.

And so we’re hoping, and again, we don’t know, but we’re hoping is we’ll continue to see both essential and non-essential retail continue to stay more open this time than we saw in the first wave. And that the openings of restaurants, especially dine-in restaurants, obviously, will be the things that are impacted. And again, those are a lot of the establishment and the customers that we hadn’t seen fully reopened. And hence we had not gotten back to our full levels of reopening. We got backed into that 90% range in the U.S. as an example.

George Tong

Got it. Very helpful. Thank you.

Doug Pertz

Hope that helps. I think, George, what’s important as well is, as we’ve gone through this even at these levels that we’ve seen the cost reductions, the cost takeouts balancing with the service levels, excuse me, with the reopening levels, not only balance that, but also provide us the opportunity for that leverage. And you saw that leverage in the quarter. And we anticipate that we’ll see that again in our fourth quarter, as we continue to see the resizing and the takeouts of that business. So we’re very excited and comfortable with that both from what we accomplished as a team in the third quarter, but also what we anticipate we’ll see as result of the continued actions in the fourth quarter. And Ron went through some of those numbers in the U.S. To be able to achieve in the U.S margins that are were greater in — percent margins that were greater in the third quarter by a 100 — what was an 130, 140, 660 basis points at revenue levels that were 9% lower than the prior year is a testament of that.

George Tong

Got it. Thank you.

Operator

Our next question comes from Tobey Sommer with – Truist Securities. Please go ahead.

Jasper Bibb

Hey, good morning. This is Jasper Bibb filling in for Tobey. I was hoping you could speak to what you’re seeing in pricing in your major markets and also how your labor expense trend is tracking versus prior years kind of amid higher global unemployment. Thanks.

Doug Pertz

Well, every country is different, Jasper. So in the U.S. the fourth quarter is typically when we take price increases. I would say generally around the world, the majority of the price increases occur in the second half. Those are happening. We’ve not had a lot of resistance. We — likewise on the labor front, it’s still — believe it or not, in this market a challenge to keep and retain employees. We’re able to reduce our variable labor very quickly globally, but at the same time, as we mentioned, that we also were very quick to take down the fixed and permanent labor to levels that have allowed this margin expansion. So I’d say basically the price increases that we had expected are on track and we’ve not seen anything that would suggest otherwise.

Jasper Bibb

Thanks. And then, I wanted to ask about kind of what trends you’re seeing for outsourcing work with financial institutions. Do you see the pandemic kind of accelerating an outsourcing trend more broadly? And how would you describe the RFP environment there?

Doug Pertz

Yes, I think generally the pandemic has accelerated a lot of the trends that we anticipated in the global cash management ecosystem. So we have been prepared for this. Right now most businesses, including financial institutions are just dealing with how to cope with the pandemic, which changes on a daily basis. What they will see in the new normal is a compelling case for additional outsourcing. We’re planning on that and we’re planning to be a leader to influence them to use Brink’s for that outsourcing.

Jasper Bibb

I appreciate it. Thanks for taking the questions, guys.

Doug Pertz

Thank you.

Ron Domanico

Thanks, Jasper.

Operator

Our next question — [Operator Instructions] Our next question will come from Jeff Kessler with Imperial Capital. Please go ahead.

Jeff Kessler

Thank you.

Doug Pertz

Good morning, Jeff.

Jeff Kessler

Good morning. And I don’t usually say this, but just excellent, excellent execution in these last couple of quarters. You’ve done a lot better than obviously than people expected, and also did a lot better than most of my comparable companies that I’m covering in your area.

Doug Pertz

Thanks, Jeff. We’ve had a great team and they’re really focused during this pandemic, in particular.

Jeff Kessler

What I want to get to is you are now significantly larger because of G4S than your next competitor. In fact, you’re probably about twice the size and it’s not just one competitors, the other competitors in the entire group. What can you do to take the scale that you now have the scale advantage you now have? I realize it’s somewhat of a softball question, but the fact is that making 2.0 work is kind of critical because it would take you to a place that would combined both scale and technology. What are the hurdles and the milestones that you have to see to show that, if you get this, then you’re going to have — you’re going to — you probably will be able to get market share gains and regain market share that you still haven’t gotten back from some institutions. The fact is that you still have some hurdles to overcome in taking your scale and using the new technology. How are you going to go through this process?

Doug Pertz

Well, Jeff, that’s a — quite a question to be, to be honest and I appreciate your comments upfront. I also think that your strategy, your thought process is exactly where we are and is a key piece of what we call SP2. I would start off by saying, unfortunately, the pandemic has negatively impacted, if you want to call that from the standpoint of slowing things down. It is, if you will, put some timing constraints both from our standpoint of implementation as well as from customers, receptiveness, openness, willingness to engage and may make change because their focus like ours has been heavily focused on the business.

I think the good news from our standpoint and our focus, you can see the results of the focus in the second and third quarter. And we anticipate that you’ll continue to see those results in the fourth quarter and our leverage going forward. But now we need to come back and we will come back as part of SP2 to put in what we call our 2.0 strategy is layered on top of that and accelerate that. So our focus to answer your question needs to be to accelerate our efforts with all of the various areas including our 2.1, which is part of our Brink’s Complete. The roll out of that both in the U.S and on a global basis, accelerate that, and use that as leverage as well as all the rest of our 2.0 strategies that we are aggressively working on to roll on.

You can see as part of the strategies as an example, the outsourcing of ATMs. You can see the very significant win that we have in France that will start coming on next year, which is the outsourcing of a completed state to what we are doing in Ireland that we won another 500 units there. These are all key outsourcing. These are things that will start rolling. If they’re not ones, they’re not projects, and they’re not changes the banks financial institutions make overnight and they take time to do that. But you can start seeing gain traction and we have now the global platform to do that.

The biggest piece and the best answer to your question, I think is that we do have, by far the largest platform, we have 50 plus countries. We have the global platform that is much larger than we can scale and roll these strategies, these solution out on. And that’s the benefit. And I think you’ll see that as we start getting the acceleration of our 2.0 Strategy to end up with higher organic growth, higher than that 7% organic growth that we had compounded over the last 3-year period of time. We’ll have higher organic growth. It’ll take some time to do it, but organic growth as a result of our strat plan.

You’ll see higher margins because these are complete total services to our customers that can and should demand both higher pricing. And I should say higher value for the complete services in the supply chain as well as then lower CapEx. And the ability to roll this out in our scale on a global basis and to use our scale for the cost management and the unique tech enabled ways that we do this, I think we’ll have a tremendous impact as we roll out of the pandemic and as we see the acceleration of these strategies. So I think that will be unmatched, which is not in the numbers we’re talking about. The numbers that we’re talking about that you saw in the second and the third quarter that you’re going to see in the fourth quarter have been primarily because of the strong focus of this management team of our company on what we’ve been able to accomplish as we’ve gone through the pandemic.

Jeff Kessler

Okay. second question is, in my years of covering Brink’s for better or for worse, the marketplace generally tends to like the focus on U.S and perhaps secondarily Mexican operations. However, with G4S, you’ve picked up not just Eastern Europe, but a whole bunch of South Eastern Asian countries that are not as affected or have done a much better job, let’s call it like it is, done a much better job of keeping down the effects of the pandemic than we have. You kind of showed up in that scale in one of the slides that you showed for Malaysia, Philippines and stuff like that. The answer is are you planning to add new — any types of new revenue services there? Or are you — are we going to be seeing a greater percentage of revenues and perhaps an improvement in operating margin in those countries where that are not as — that you picked up from G4S, that are not as impacted by places like United States and Mexico and France and South America?

Doug Pertz

Well, I’m not sure the answer to your question is absolutely, yes. We’re going to improve, which is our 1.0 wider and deeper, our leveraged strategies. We’re going to improve margins of those countries in the core base businesses. And we’re going to leverage 2.0 new services, added services in these markets. I’m not sure I fully understand or agree with the question around the pandemic, is that changing how we’re going to roll them out in those countries versus others. In other words, we’re not looking at just over the next quarter.

Over the next year, we think we have the opportunity to start rolling out in many, many of the countries our 2.0 strategies and the pandemic is going to impact it as it has some already in slowing some of that down. But that doesn’t mean it’s still not a great solution. In fact, in many cases, a lot of the solutions we’re talking about make a heck of a lot more sense. So I understand there’ll be ups and downs associated with that. And your evaluation of Hong Kong is an example.

You can see Hong Kong stayed about flat or within a couple of percentage points of revenues over that period of time. That’s why there’s not much different and change in color there. And Singapore continued to improve. And it was back at levels that like you said, were like pre-pandemic or better. So Malaysia has continued to improve. So you’re correct in terms of your analysis there. But we’re not going to let that stand in in a way of any place to really say we shouldn’t be aggressively implementing our 2.0 strategies and our continued 1.0 strategies to improve our business as you’re seeing this year.

Jeff Kessler

Okay. And let me just throw this last one quickly. Do we not think in terms of the CompuSafe brand anymore? Is CompuSafe not going to be part of 2.0 and will it — and as a whole, or is CompuSafe still going to be sold to some as a separate or sole, should say, sole rented out and put out there as a separate entity.

Doug Pertz

Well, if you think about CompuSafe or you think about other smart safes that are offered in the classic CIT system like we did and others do, it’s a different offering. It’s not a complete offering. And the value proposition for the customer is not as strong. Therefore, I think that the market will move over to our Brink’s Complete system. It will include all the same benefits if there are significant benefits of a smart safe that’s out there today, but it will also be a complete fully managed system, providing daily credit from one source including Brink’s as at one source plus all the integrated benefits associated with that. So the answer is it will transition.

Jeff Kessler

Okay, great. Thank you very much.

Doug Pertz

Thank you, Jeff. Thanks for your comments. One more question? I think we have time for one more, then we have to cut it off.

Operator

Our next question comes from Sam England with Berenberg. Please go ahead.

Doug Pertz

Hi, Sam.

Ron Domanico

Good morning, Sam.

Sam England

Good morning, guys. Yes, just building on one of those last questions. You mentioned the broadening of Strategy 1.0 cost improvements globally. But I just wondered which markets you think represent the best opportunities for that? Is it mainly the developed European markets that you’ve acquired with G4S? And then are you planning to set a longer term margin target at some point, similar to the original 1.0 plan, presumably once things get less volatile.

Doug Pertz

The answer to your second part is absolutely we do. We anticipate that some point in time in the future, we will have — we’ll hold a Investor Conference. And in such as we committed to in the past, we anticipate that we’ll roll out some targets in the future. Those targets and as we talk about on that slide, our strategy includes continued 1.0 wider and deeper initiatives, that are costs initiatives, that are productivity initiatives, that are productivity improvements that help support our customer service initiatives and those are in every country. That’s why they’re called wider and deeper in those countries. We believe — and the continuous improvement is a way of life and part of our culture.

We believe that we can always do better both for our customers and for our productivity and our efficiencies. And that, therefore, it’s an integral piece to each of our business plans that are rolled up both as part of the strat plan and annual plans, every country as a target for cost reduction, margin improvements, and productivity improvements that are passed on to our customer. That is now augmented by the leverage initiative, which is the Priority 3 strategy that was part of the pandemic focus that allows us to gain the leverage that we spoke about because of our management and controlling of what I consider permanent fixed cost reductions ongoing as well layered on top of that. What we’re suggesting is every country is part of this and you’ll see the benefits associated with that. So we will come out and say that, and that’s prior to doing anything at 1.5 beyond G4S. And it’s prior — this is in addition to our 2.0 Strategy roll out as well.

Sam England

Okay, great. And then if you’ve got time for one other quick one, I just wondered what happened with the revenues you talked about in Q2 that have been invoiced for, but not recorded in the numbers. And I think it was within the U.S. retail business. I didn’t see anything mentioned about it. Sorry, if you talked about it.

Doug Pertz

Yes, that — those continued to be able to invoice some of those, but a much smaller component of those as they — as those customers come back. We do the credit memos that offset negotiations, if you will, by customer and you end up with some benefit in the third quarter of that. But it’s also offset in general by the credit memos as well as bad debt reserves. So there is some benefit, but it’s very, very minimal and that’ll continue to be less and less going forward.

Sam England

Okay, great. Thanks very much.

Doug Pertz

Thank you.

Ron Domanico

Thanks, Sam.

Doug Pertz

I think that …

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this …

Doug Pertz

Yes, please go ahead.

Operator

This will conclude our question-and-answer session, and it also concludes our call for today. We thank you for attending the Brink’s company’s third quarter 2020 conference call. And at this time, you may disconnect your lines.

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Minerals Technologies Inc (MTX) Q3 2020 Earnings Call Transcript
Oct 30 2020
Minerals Technologies Inc (MTX) Q3 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

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Minerals Technologies Inc (NYSE:MTX)
Q3 2020 Earnings Call
Oct 30, 2020, 11:00 a.m. ET

Contents:

  • Prepared Remarks
  • Questions and Answers
  • Call Participants

Prepared Remarks:

Operator

Good day everyone and welcome to the Third Quarter 2020 Minerals Technologies Earnings Call. Today’s call is being recorded. And at this time, I would like to turn the call over to Erik Aldag, Head of Investor Relations of Minerals Technologies. Please go ahead, Mr. Aldag.

Erik Aldag — Head of Investor Relations

Thanks, Sarah. Good morning everyone and welcome to our third quarter 2020 earnings conference call. Today’s call will be led by Chief Executive Officer, Doug Dietrich and Chief Financial Officer, Matt Garth. Following our prepared remarks, we will open it up to questions.

I’d like to remind you that beginning on Page 14 of our 2019 10-K, we list the various risk factors and conditions that may affect our future results. And I’ll also point out the Safe Harbor disclaimer on this slide. Statements related to future performance by members of our team are subject to these limitations, cautionary remarks and conditions.

I’ll now turn the call over to Doug. Doug?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Thanks for the introduction, Erik, and good morning everyone. We appreciate you taking the time to join today’s call and I hope you are all staying safe and healthy. Let me outline a brief agenda for the call. I’ll begin by taking you through our third quarter highlights, including improving trends in our sales results, strengthened operational and financial profile, and progress made on the business development front. I’ll then turn it over to Matt to provide a more detailed look at our third quarter performance by business segment. I’ll conclude our prepared remarks by discussing trends in our end markets and highlighting new business that will contribute to our volume growth next year.

First, I want to comment on the 8-K we filed this week related to a ransomware attack we recently experienced which impacted access to some of our company’s IT systems. We have procedures and protocols in place for situations like this. Immediately after detecting the incident, we implemented our comprehensive cyber security response plan, including taking steps to isolate and carefully restore our network to resume normal operations as quickly as possible. We’ve notified law enforcement and have been working with industry-leading cyber security experts to conduct a thorough investigation. Throughout this situation, we operated our facilities safely and met our customer commitments.

Before going through the third quarter review, I’d like to note that I’m very pleased with how our global team and businesses have performed in what continues to be a complex and challenging environment. We remain focused on managing our company with an unwavering commitment to keeping our employees safe, operating our plants efficiently and serving our customers with value-added products. Dedication, engagement and resilience of our employees has been nothing short of exemplary during these times. And I want to thank them for the perseverance they’ve shown over the past several months.

Let me take you through how our third quarter unfolded. As we previewed in July, we anticipated that demand conditions in our end markets would improve with the second quarter having the most acute impacts from COVID-19, and that’s largely how the quarter played out as we were prepared to respond to the volume recovery, which led to sequential sales growth in nearly all of our product lines.

Overall, we had a solid quarter from an operational and commercial standpoint. These results reflect our team’s disciplined execution related to cost control, pricing and productivity, which resulted in higher sequential and year-over-year operating margins. We also demonstrate how our strong product portfolio and end market mix has enabled us to capture opportunities with existing and new customers.

From a financial perspective, total sales in the quarter were $388 million, an increase of about 9% sequentially, but still at lower levels compared to last year. As we indicated on our last call, our July sales were trending upwards and demand conditions in several markets continued to strengthen throughout the rest of the quarter. We generated $52 million of operating income and earnings per share were $0.92. In addition, we delivered $54 million in cash from operations, continuing our solid cash generation profile.

After experiencing volatile conditions in our businesses that serve industrial-related end markets through the second quarter, we saw considerable demand improvements in the third quarter, one with continued strength in our consumer-oriented product lines.

Let me touch on some of the highlights. Metalcasting business continued to rebound as our foundry customers in North America ramped up production to meet the demand increase in the automotive sector. At the end of the third quarter, our Metalcasting facilities were operating at about 95% of last year’s levels, a noticeable improvement from the reduced levels seen earlier. In addition, penetration of our pre-blended products remains on a strong growth trajectory in China as sales increased 20% over last year and this momentum should continue moving forward.

Sales in our portfolio of consumer products which includes Pet Care, Personal Care, and Edible Oil Purification remained resilient, led by an 11% year-over-year growth in Pet Care. We continue to strengthen our robust private label Pet Care portfolio in North America and Europe and have expanded our presence through partnerships with several new customers.

Another area to highlight is our global PCC business which benefited from satellite restarts in India and North America, combined with an improved demand environment from the low levels in the second quarter. As we indicated on our last call, July volumes were trending approximately 15% higher compared to June, and these dynamics continued through the third quarter. Of note, Paper PCC sales in China continue to deliver a solid performance with 18% growth over last year. In addition, Specialty PCC sales increased sequentially as automotive and construction demand strengthened through the quarter and food and pharmaceutical applications remained at strong levels.

Other pockets of strength came in our Talc and GCC business as demand improved for our products used in residential and commercial construction, as well as automotive applications. And in our Refractories business, we see steel utilization rates increased in the U.S. from a low of 50% in the second quarter to 65% at the end of September.

While many of our businesses returned to a positive trajectory, we’ve had some challenges in our project-oriented businesses, such as Environmental Products, Building Materials and Energy Services, which are still experiencing volatility in order patterns and timing delays. Energy Services was further impacted by several hurricanes that occurred in the Gulf of Mexico during the quarter. As our volumes began to trend upward through the quarter, we were able to leverage these sales into income, resulting in overall operating and EBITDA margin improvement on both a sequential and year-over-year basis.

We’ve maintained our focus on operational efficiency, including variable cost adjustments and structural overhead savings, as well as on continued pricing increases, capturing favorable raw material costs and increasing sales of higher-value products. As markets continue to recover, we are well-positioned to expand margins further on increased volumes.

Our focus on strengthening our financial position also remains a priority with an emphasis on tightly controlling our cash generation cycle and creating more flexibility around our capital structure. We delivered another quarter of strong cash flow generation, the majority of which was used to pay down debt.

While navigating through the current environment, we’ve remain focused on advancing our growth initiatives and made further progress this quarter on several fronts. Let me go through some of these highlights in more detail. The commissioning of two new PCC satellites scheduled for the fourth quarter continue to move ahead, currently ramping up production at our 45,000 ton facility in India, our 150,000 ton satellite in China should be operational by December. We will also be resuming production in November at our previously closed satellite in Wickliffe, Kentucky to support Phoenix Paper’s restart of that mill.

During the quarter, we made a small acquisition of a hauling and mining company to further strengthen our vertically integrated position at our bentonite mines in Wyoming. This transaction improves our cost position and enhances our flexibility with our mining and/or transportation in the region. In our Refractories business, we signed two new five-year contracts to supply our refractory and metallurgical wire products in the U.S. These contracts total approximately $50 million or about $10 million of incremental revenue on an annual basis.

Our new product development efforts are progressing well as we look to accelerate the pace of commercialization and drive new revenue opportunities. We commercialized 36 value-added products so far in 2020 with contributions from each of our businesses. 12 of these products were introduced in the third quarter. We kept at a similar pace to last year, while conducting many of these product development activities virtually.

All in all, there are a number of positives about our performance in the quarter, especially, how we’ve executed as a company, while navigating through difficult conditions. There are still some challenges ahead. With strong momentum across many of our businesses and with an enhanced cost profile, we expect to continue to deliver improved profitability as volumes recover.

With that, I’ll turn it over to Matt to discuss our results in more detail. Matt?

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Doug. I’ll now review our third quarter results, the performance of our four segments, as well as our cash flow and liquidity positions. I’ll then turn the call back over to Doug for some additional perspective on our current operating environment and the visibility we have going forward.

Now, let’s get into the review of the third quarter results. Third quarter sales were $388.3 million, 9% higher sequentially and 14% below the prior year. Gross margin, EBITDA margin and operating margin all improved sequentially and versus the prior year, driven by our continued pricing and productivity actions. SG&A expense was flat with the second quarter, and also contributed to the margin expansion. Earnings per share, excluding special items was $0.92 and we incurred special charges of $3.2 million after-tax in the third quarter or $0.09 per share. Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 19.8% versus 19.1% in the prior year and 16% in the prior quarter. Going forward, we expect our effective tax rate to be approximately 20%.

Now, let’s review the changes in sales and operating income in more detail. On this slide, we are presenting the year-over-year comparisons of sales and operating income on the left side, and the sequential quarter comparisons on the right side. Third quarter sales were 13% lower than the prior year on a constant currency basis. Slowdown in economic activity brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic continue to impact our volumes on a year-over-year basis in the quarter. The operating income bridge on the bottom left shows we were able to significantly offset the impact of lower sales versus the prior year, the favorable pricing and cost performance driven by the actions we have taken after the last year. These actions resulted in higher operating margin versus the prior year despite the lower volume.

On a sequential basis, we saw significant improvement in demand with sales up 7% adjusting for currency and up 9% overall. Conditions improved across most of our end markets and we maintained pricing levels across the company. On our last call, we told you that sales rates in July were trending approximately 5% higher than June, and this trend accelerated through the rest of the third quarter. Daily sales rates in August were 6% higher than July and September was 7% higher than August.

Operating income increased 18% sequentially on a constant currency basis, primarily due to the improvement in our end markets and continued cost control. Operating margin was 13.3% in the quarter versus 13.2% in the prior year, and 11.8% in the second quarter.

Now, let’s take a closer look at the operating margins and how they have improved on the next slide. On this slide, we are showing year-over-year and sequential operating margin bridges for the third quarter. Starting with the prior year comparison, our pricing and cost actions contributed 190 basis points of improvement, which more than offset the unfavorable volume impact. On a sequential basis, we leveraged additional volume into 60 basis points of margin improvement and our continued cost control contributed another 70 basis points of favorability. The actions we have taken on pricing, productivity, cost control and new product development have positioned us well to leverage incremental volumes into improved margins going forward. Another margin related highlight for the third quarter was that EBITDA margin improved by 70 basis points versus both the prior year and the prior quarter.

Now, let’s turn to the segment review, starting with Performance Materials. Performance Materials sales increased 10% sequentially and were 8% lower than the prior year. Metalcasting sales grew 26% sequentially as foundry production improved in North America and demand remained strong in China. The improvement in North America was primarily driven by the ramp up of automotive production. China Metalcasting sales grew 11% sequentially and 20% versus the prior year on continued strong demand from our customers and continued penetration of our specially formulated blended products. Household, Personal Care and Specialty Product sales remained resilient, up 7% sequentially and flat with the prior year on continued strong demand for consumer-oriented products. Meanwhile, Environmental Products and Building Materials continued to experience COVID-19-related project delays, and sales remained below prior year levels.

Operating income for the segment was $28.2 million, up 34% sequentially and up 5% versus the prior year. Operating margin was 14.8% of sales, up 270 basis points from the second quarter and up 180 basis points from the prior year. Continued pricing actions, strong cost control and expense reductions, more than offset the operating income impact of lower sales versus the prior year.

The chart on the bottom right shows daily sales rates by month this year compared to the prior year. This segment experienced a clear rebound in demand and sales increased steadily throughout the third quarter. We would normally expect a seasonal decrease in sales for this segment between the third and fourth quarters, driven by our construction and environmental end markets. However, this year, we expect to offset the typical seasonality with continued positive momentum in our other markets. Overall, we expect fourth quarter sales to be similar to the third quarter, despite the typical seasonal effects. I’d also like to note that we experienced higher mining and energy costs, while operating in colder months, and this will temporarily impact segment margins in the fourth quarter.

Now let’s move to Specialty Minerals. Specialty Minerals sales were $125.1 million in the third quarter, up 14% sequentially and 13% below the prior year. PCC sales increased 14% sequentially as paper mill capacity came back online in the U.S. and India, following temporary COVID-19-related shutdowns. Paper PCC sales in China grew 11% sequentially, and 18% over the prior year on continued penetration and strong customer demand. Specialty PCC sales increased 16% sequentially as automotive and construction demand improved through the quarter and consumer-oriented products remained strong. Processed Minerals sales increased 13% as end market steadily improved through the quarter.

Operating income excluding special items was $18 million, up 18% sequentially and 17% below the prior year and represented 14.4% of sales, which compared to 13.9% in the second quarter and 15.2% in the prior year. The impact of lower volume versus the prior year was partially offset by continued pricing actions and cost control. Daily sales rates charged for this segment also shows improving conditions through the third quarter and we expect this trend to continue into the fourth quarter as paper production in the U.S., Europe and India continues to ramp up. In addition, we are bringing online new capacity in the next several months and most of this capacity will come online late in the fourth quarter.

The sequential improvement in Paper PCC will offset the typical seasonality we experience in the residential construction markets served by the other path lines [Phonetic]. Overall, for the segment, we expect fourth quarter sales to be similar to the third quarter.

Now let’s turn to Refractories. Refractories segment sales were $59.3 million in the third quarter, up 6% sequentially as steel mill utilization rates gradually improved from second quarter levels in both North America and Europe. Segment operating income was $7.3 million, up 24% from the prior quarter and represented 12.3% of sales. Again, you can see improvement in the daily sales rates through the third quarter. We expect continued improvement in the fourth quarter as steel utilization rates improve and laser equipment sales pickup. And, overall, for the segment, we expect a modest sequential improvement in sales in the fourth quarter versus the third quarter.

Now let’s turn to Energy Services. Energy Services segment experienced significant customer project delays in the third quarter. These delays were related to COVID-19 restrictions, as well as several weather-related shutdowns in the Gulf of Mexico and what has been a very active storm season. As a result, sales were $13.3 million and operating income was breakeven for the third quarter. The daily sales rates chart shows the solid start to the year, followed by sales levels that have remained low relative to the prior year. We continue to see a strong pipeline of activity and we expect sequential improvement for this business in the fourth quarter.

Now, let’s turn to our cash flow and liquidity highlights. As Doug noted, third quarter cash from operations totaled $54 million and free cash flow was $40 million. We continued our balanced approach in deploying cash flow, paying down $30 million of debt and we resumed our share repurchases acquiring $3 million of shares in the quarter. We continue to repurchase shares in October and completed the expiring program with $50 million of shares under the $75 million authorization. As noted earlier, the Board of Directors has approved a new one-year $75 million repurchase program. Our net leverage ratio is 2.1 times EBITDA and we have $682 million of liquidity including over $375 million of cash on hand.

And before I hand it back over to Doug for the market outlook, I’d like to summarize my comments on what we are expecting for the fourth quarter in each of our segments. In our Minerals businesses, we expect continued improvement and many of our markets to offset the typical seasonality, and we expect sales to be similar to the third quarter. Margins will remain strong on a year-over-year basis, though, sequentially, margins will be impacted by seasonally higher mining and energy costs.

In our Services business, we expect continued gradual improvement in Refractories as utilization rates improve and we expect sequential improvement in Energy Services as delayed projects resume and activity levels pick up.

Overall, we expect MTI sales in the fourth quarter to be similar to the third quarter.

With that, let me turn it back over to Doug to discuss our current end market conditions and outlook in more detail. Doug?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Thanks, Matt. Before beginning the Q&A portion of the call, I wanted to take some time to provide a little more insight into the conditions across each of our businesses and where we see opportunities to drive incremental growth. The improving market trends experienced across most of our businesses will likely extend through the rest of the year, while our project-oriented businesses may continue to face persistent challenges with uncertain customer order patterns.

In addition, as we build on the momentum from the third quarter, we’re also executing on a wide range of attractive growth projects which will accrue to revenue in 2021.

Let me now take you through what’s happening by business segment, starting with Performance Materials, our largest and most diverse segment. Our Household and Personal Care product line will continue on its strong sales trajectory as demand for these products stays high and we leverage our expanded channels and presence with new customers. Specifically, we’re growing our portfolio of premium Pet Care products in both North America and Europe with the expansion of new online retail channels with larger customers, and the introduction of new products such as our 100% carbon-neutral Eco Care product in Europe, an example of how we’re satisfying customer preferences, while also contributing to our sustainability efforts.

In addition, sales of our Edible Oil Purification products have more than doubled since last year as we grow this business through an expanded global customer base. In our Metalcasting business, we expect to continue to benefit from the automotive demand rebound in North America. Noted earlier, we expanded our customer base in China through the continued penetration of our higher value blended products, which led to sales growth of 20% over last year. Our solid growth trend there will continue for the rest of the year and into 2021.

I’ll touch on Environmental Products and Building Materials together as they are both experiencing similar dynamics. While each maintains a robust and active pipeline and continues to introduce more specialized products, these businesses have been impacted by timing delays around when customers will commence larger remediation and water proofing projects.

Switching to the Specialty Minerals segment where I’ll begin with Paper PCC. With paper demand in North America and Europe gradually improving, we expect sequential volume growth in all regions in the fourth quarter. Asia and, China more specifically, will continue its solid growth trajectory. We’ll also benefit from the ramp up of our satellite in India, and our new satellite in China should be operational in December. On the horizon, we have two new facilities coming online in the first half of 2021, one for a packaging application in Europe, and another for a standard PCC facility in India. Overall, we’re bringing online 285,000 tons of new PCC capacity over the next three quarters. We also maintain a very active business development pipeline across our broad portfolio of PCC technologies, including high filler, packaging and recycling. Each of these opportunities could add to our overall volume total next year.

In our Specialty PCC, GCC and Talc businesses, sales for our pharmaceutical and consumer products, including food applications will remain strong. Demand for our high-performance sealant and plastic products that are used for automotive applications should strengthen as build rates continue to improve in North America and Europe. And sales for products used in residential and commercial construction applications should stay steady.

For the Refractories segment, current steel utilization rates in North America and Europe are around 70% and 65%, respectively, and we expect these rates to gradually improve in the upcoming quarters. In addition, our order book for laser measurement equipment remains strong in the fourth quarter. As I mentioned earlier, we’ve recently signed two five-year contracts totaling $50 million to supply our broad portfolio of refractory and metallurgical wire products, which will start to accrue to revenue growth in 2021.

Finishing up the discussion with Energy Services, where we maintain an active pipeline of offshore services, while COVID-19 and adverse weather conditions have led to some early demobilizations or postponements from our larger offshore projects, some of these projects have been rescheduled to resume in the fourth quarter. In addition, we’ve recently been awarded new large projects in the Gulf of Mexico, which we expect to commence over the next few quarters.

We’re focused on navigating through a highly dynamic environment and our culture of continuous improvement positions us to do so. Over the past six months, we’ve been successfully implementing virtual tools to help improve productivity, efficiency and connectivity with our employees and customers. And I’ve been impressed with how quickly we’ve adapted to the changing environment. These tools have enabled us to run our business smoothly as we connect seamlessly with our operating facilities for meetings and site visits, conduct problem solving Kaizen events and collaborate and communicate efficiently with our global customer base. Many of these new ways that we’re operating on, on a daily basis will become permanent and we’ll balance them with in-person activities.

As we look ahead into 2021, I’m confident in the direction we’re heading, the solid foundation we have in place to leverage improved market conditions and the growth projects we have in hand. While COVID-related uncertainties still persist, our end market conditions continue to show signs of improvement. With the operational actions we’ve taken, we are well-positioned to drive improved profitability. In addition, strength and flexibility of our balance sheet provides solid resources to support both organic and inorganic growth opportunities.

Before taking your questions, I want to say to our team at MTI how proud I am of the way they’ve executed and performed in what has been an incredibly complex and dynamic environment, and thank them again for their dedication and engagement.

With that, let’s open the call to questions.

Questions and Answers:

Operator

[Operator Instructions] All right, the first question is from Daniel Moore with CJS Securities.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Doug, Matt. Good morning, thanks for taking the questions.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Hey, Dan.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Good morning.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

I wanted to start with PCC. Can you just refresh us or break down the revenue by geography in Q3, where we are today as a baseline, and where do you see that by the end of ’21, given all the new scheduled capacity coming online?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Let me start, Dan, I’ll give you kind of a bridge to the new capacity and volumes that we see for 2021. And then, Matt, maybe you can have a word sort of revenue by geography. As I mentioned, we’re bringing on about 285,000 tons of capacity, 200,000 of that will be here in the fourth quarter, ramping up kind of this quarter and into the first, and then another 85,000 tons in the first half of next year, and that’s two facilities, the packaging and another facility in India.

This year, we experienced shutdowns, if you remember last call, Verso Paper and Domtar mill in Ashdown, Arkansas totaling about 100,000 tons of volume came out this year. So net-net, we’re up about 185,000 tons next year, by the middle of next year we will have installed about 185,000 tons of incremental. Given the timing of when they come on and as they ramp up, we see probably 125,000, 150,000 tons of new volume in 2021 kind of on an annualized basis. So when you get to the second half of next year, you should be on an annualized run rate of about 150,000 tons of additional volume.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Very helpful, given all the puts and takes we’ve had over the last couple of quarters. And then just trying to get a sense for what the new baseline looks like as Europe and as far as Asia and China continue to grow, India as well, while North America has been on a bit of a different trajectory. Any update there?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. So I think it’s — let me go back, pick the right baseline. So if you look at our 2019 volumes, before going into 2020 with all the puts and takes I just gave you, we’re are about 2.9 million tons of PCC. We’ve had a — you saw the chart, the big dip in volumes through the second quarter and a gradual improvement through the third and we think into the fourth. With this additional volume, we should probably, by the end of next year, be back to that level. Right? And then with the additional volume accruing into the next year. So again, look, we have — there is a lot of demand conditions that have to continue through the fourth quarter and into the first and seeing where we are with kind of COVID-related uncertainties, but if you’ve taken like on of ’19 base with the puts and takes from this year, we should be able to get back to that level run rate basis by the end of next year.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Okay, I’ll do some of the math offline on geography. Go ahead, sorry.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

No. No, and, Dan, I was going to give you actually that rough breakdown on a geographic basis. And let’s do it on a revenue basis as you asked for. It’s roughly 40% in the North America region, they’re going to have, the rest fairly split between Europe and Asia. There is a small bit in there, call it, 5% that exists in Latin America, but that’s the way we’d break it down.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Perfect. That’s helpful. Okay.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

I’ll add to that, Dan…

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Sorry, go ahead.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

I’ll add to that, that’s what we have in hand. So if things kind of stop today, that’s how that’s going to shake out. There are — we always talk about we have a pipeline of opportunities that we continue to work on. They are in different stages, technologies in terms of our high filler, our new yield products, recycling and those — many of those are in advanced stages of discussion which also should accrue to — could accrue to volume next year as well.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

That was my follow-up was some of the new — it seems like the dam is breaking a little bit for new contracts. Are you seeing increased momentum there? And it sounds like you are, at least, with some of the new technologies.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, let me give you — D.J., are you there? You want to give a little color about some of our new technologies and some of the trials we’re running?

D.J. Monagle, III — Group President, Specialty Minerals and Refractories

Yeah, sure. Glad to. And Dan, just to further the conversation on regional breakdown, for the standard PCCs, I would say that, of the contracts we’re chasing on standard PCC and the putting in writing grades, most of that is India and China and the rest of Southeast Asia. So that shift will continue to happen. And then if we look at the new technologies, it’s kind of a balance. The new yield technology that we’ve got where we’ve run some pretty successful machine trials and we’re into the commercial discussions, that’s a little bit more in Europe and the Americas, kind of balanced between those two.

If I look at the new products in packaging, the most momentum we have right now for the white grades, the whiteboard packaging would be North American Packaging and then we’ve got a couple of products in brown grades, that newer technology, one being new yield, others being a new product design for brown paper. Those would be in the Americas too. So standard PCC, clear path for growth and a good pull in Asia. And then the new products seem to be getting more momentum in the Americas and a little bit in Europe.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Perfect. That’s Helpful. A lot of really good work done on the cost side and a lot of discussion in the prepared remarks about the opportunity for margins to move higher. Just remind us either across the businesses or consolidated, what incremental margins typically would look like and whether we’d see upside to those kind of historical typical incremental margins over the next 12-plus months, given some of those cost-reduction initiatives as volumes do recover?

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, Dan. And what we’ve typically told you, and if you remember in the beginning of the year, as revenues were tracking down, we talked about the decremental margins being in that 30% range and that’s been proved out as you look at the second quarter. What’s come back on the incremental margins has also been in that 30% range. Now it’s a little bit north of there and we would expect with the cost control that we’ve been seeing and the effort on our fixed cost expenses, that we would be able to move that incremental margin as the volumes are coming back. So I’d use those two numbers around 30% either decremental or incremental for now. And we’ll prove it out as it’s expanding over the next coming quarters.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

And, Dan, I didn’t answer your initial question. There is absolutely room for margins to move north. If you take a look at the margin chart in terms of the volume impact we’ve absorbed and offset, that volume at those incremental margins really accrue to income but also those margins as well. We’re always looking at opportunities to become more efficient with our culture in terms of productivities and looking for ways to do things better. We’ve captured a lot of that over the summer and in these months, but that’s part of our DNA. We do that constantly.

And so we’re always looking for ways to continue to hold costs or reduce costs, so that those new products, those higher margin products and that volume, as our markets continue to recover, all drop right to the bottom-line and help those — that margin story. So I think we always talked about 15%. If you take that volume from the first quarter or even just from last year, we’d be north of that right now.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Perfect. Last from me and I’ll hand it over. You gave very good color on Q4 and then some color on some of the margins for the individual — the individual segments. Overall, if we put all those together, margins flat or slightly down from Q3 sequentially, based on how we see the world today. Is that the right takeaway or is there a better conclusion?

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

What we told you, we basically laid out the trajectory for revenues to be essentially the same. Now, the mix of revenues is going to change. And one item we also called out for you, Dan, was the higher mining and energy costs, there can also be some other incremental costs that will be in there, and those are going to be in that $2 million to $3 million range. So you are going to see the margin impact taking place just based on sort of those seasonal temporary effects of the mining and energy costs, while revenues are staying relatively flat.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Perfect, thank you. I’ll jump back for any follow-up.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah. But, Dan, just to be clear, those margins continue that trend of being above the prior year, so strength in the margin story, but sequentially because of those seasonal effects, will be down.

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Understood. Now, that’s really helpful. Thank you.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from Silke Kueck with J.P. Morgan.

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Hi, good morning. How are you?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Good, Silke, how are you?

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Good. Do you have any view on [Indecipherable] just the fourth quarter, have your customers shackled [Phonetic] anything about whether there’ll be shutdowns in the U.S. in December or there won’t be, and what, sort of, like that trajectory looks like? Like it looks like the — there’s sort of like some COVID shutdowns coming in Europe, like often there’s some seasonal shutdowns that happen in the U.S. in December, and the Asian markets, they’re really strong. And so, like I was just wondering like what you hear from your customers.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Sure. Let me start it off and then I think we’ll talk more about the automotive, the impacts, just to remind everyone, impacts in automotive have — primarily in North America and Asia for our Metalcasting business, we supply more of the automotive industry, and our Minerals businesses in our Specialty PCC, a little bit more of North America and Europe focus. So just to give you the breakdown of those impacts. Jon Hastings, you want to talk a little bit about Metalcasting and what we’re hearing from customers going into the fourth quarter?

Jonathan J. Hastings — Minerals Technologies, Inc. — Group President, Performance Materials

Sure, Doug. Hi, Silke. How are you?

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Good.

Jonathan J. Hastings — Minerals Technologies, Inc. — Group President, Performance Materials

Let me touch base on North America, I’ll talk about China and then also Southeast Asia. But what we’re seeing in North America is everybody is running pretty well, pretty strong. As you know, auto production went south in Q2, rebounded in Q3, but the inventories are remaining low and everybody’s looking to restock the pipeline and auto sales remained pretty strong. All of our customers are telling us that they are running fairly strong throughout the remainder of the year. Again, we’ll see what happens around the end of year holiday season with shutdowns, but we don’t expect any major impact. We see it fairly strong.

China, about 40% of our business is in auto and heavy truck in China and we’ve seen a very, very strong year. The build rate — the customers are — has come back extraordinarily strong in Q3. We expect that to continue into Q4. What we see is not only domestic production and consumption but then also the exports, exports of parts and also vehicles going into both U.S. and Europe. Those continue to rebound and, as a result, the demand has been very strong. The last region in the world that’s rebounding is Southeast Asia. And what we’re seeing is that they’re currently running at about — our business is about 80% year on year. That’s a relatively small piece of our Metalcasting business worldwide. But we do see that increasing on a sequential basis and that’s because the auto production in Thailand, Korea, Indonesia — they’re on the rebound, coming off the COVID shutdowns. So that’s the last region and overall, we continue to look pretty strong going through Q4.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

So, Silke, the only thing I’d add to that is, look, I think, our visibility in the middle of the third quarter was probably a little bit stronger going into — looking into the fourth. I will — addressing, I think questions coming from, with the shutdowns, recent news in Europe and what we’re seeing around the world, yes, it’s a bit of cautious, but right now, what we can see through the fourth quarter is kind of continued demand levels, as Jon alluded. And that includes the automotive supply that we have through North America and Europe and our Specialty PCC business for now. But we continue to watch it and we’re prepared to react accordingly.

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Okay. And then secondly, yeah, it looks like your cash balance is like getting close to like $400 million again. Like, what are you going to do with all the cash? Keep it to kind of begin to buyback share is more meaningful? What are your capital allocation plans?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Our capital allocation has remained similar to what it was. We talked about that in the last call. Look, I think going into April, ensuring that our balance sheet was in solid shape was — it was a priority and making sure that liquidity was there and our debt maturities were proper for the environment. We took advantage of the markets — capital markets in June, and we did just that. We pushed out maturities, $400 million unsecured out eight years. We left some cash on the balance sheet. And right now where we stand, we think that’s a great position to have to make sure that regardless what happens, this company’s liquidity position is solid. We do have a solid cash flow year which is good, as we’ve made some adjustments in working capital. And so we continue to put that cash on the balance sheet.

I think, right now, our priority is making sure our debt positions — we’ve paid $30 million in the third quarter. I think we’ll continue to steer our capital more to that direction. But as you know, we have a $75 million authorization that we intend to execute on, and we have some cash on the balance sheet for opportunities. We’re going to support these growth projects that I mentioned today and do things like a small — we have our small hauling business that we acquired, we have a nice portfolio and profile of potential companies we think worked for us. And so I think our balance sheet is in a good position for all of that, repay debt, execute on our share repurchase program and ensure that we have resources to support our growth initiatives.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

And, Silke, let me just add the free cash flow dimension to that. And Doug talked about the strength of the story and you saw here in the third quarter, generating another $40 million of free cash flow. If you listen to the call from last quarter, we told you that we were going to generate about $100 million to $120 million of free cash flow in the quarter — sorry, in the year. Based on what we’re seeing now through the rest of the year, we’re in the $140 million to $150 million range of free cash flow generation in 2020 for the company, and that includes continuing to invest in the company from a sustaining EHS and growth perspective. That capex level is going to be in the $60 million to $70 million range and so feeling good about, as Doug said, a very balanced approach toward the use of our cash flow generation.

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

So it seems like you’ll have plenty of cash to buy back $70 million worth of stock? You think that’s a a good investment?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, we think it is a good investment, Silke. So — but that’s not to say that — we’ve always talked about our approach and making sure that our debt levels are down at target levels, first investing in ourselves and our growth opportunities where we see the returns and that fit our strategy, and then, yes, we will balance returning cash to shareholders, and also as acquisitions, potentially there. As those change, we can share — steer more toward share repurchases and as those opportunities, we’d steer more toward our inorganic opportunities. So we’ll continue that approach. But I think the point is that making sure that we are in solid footing, regardless of what economy we’re in. I think we have that position, and being able to take advantage of opportunities, be it in the market for a return to shareholders or in the market for things that we think fit our core capabilities from an inorganic standpoint.

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Thanks very much.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Gives us a lot of options, Silke.

Operator

All right. And the next question is from Rosemarie Morbelli with G. Research.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Thank you. Good morning, everyone.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Rosemarie.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

So just finishing up on the cost side, how much of — first of all, do you have a dollar amount in terms of how much you have been eliminating in terms of costs? And then, how much of that do you think is only temporary and will come back?

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah. Silke, if you take — I’m sorry, Rosemarie.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

It’s OK. We both have an accent.

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

Yeah, thank you very much, Rosemarie. If you take a look at what we just showed you, on a year-over-year basis, with the effort of cost that we have taken out in terms of expenses, fixed costs, starting with the restructuring that took place in the middle of last year where we told you that would be about $12 million. Since that time, we’ve also seen expenses and related to T&E and also other cost, meaning other headcount costs coming out that we haven’t been back filling and that we’ve been finding a way to be more efficient overall in our system, so that we would not need to backfill those heads. When we talk about what’s permanent and what’s not permanent, we say that about two-thirds of the overall cost benefit that we’ve been experiencing on a year-over-year basis is going to stay in place. And so we showed you here in the third quarter that that was about 180 basis points worth of favorability. And so, you could expect that to continue on at about a two-thirds basis going forward.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Thank you. That’s helpful. And then still on the quick questions type of answers, this last year of your $75 million of authorization, you only bought back $50 million worth of stock. Do you think that this year you could get closer to that full authorization?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah. So I think, Rosemarie, we were on track to do the full $75 million authorization. We suspended that in March after the first quarter, given the conditions. And so our pace was to — and our intent was to fully fulfill that authorization. So we took a pause over the summer, making sure we preserved cash, making sure that we are in the right position, as I mentioned earlier, on our balance sheet and then when we saw — as the cash flow and our balance sheet, resumed it with the remaining time that we had. We ended up with $50 million due to a bit of a pause. We have the cash on hand to be able to do that $75 million and I think we’d intend to do that going forward.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

All right, thank you. And still on the cash note, I thought that with your debt level as low as it is right now, you had kind of post-debt repayment. I suppose I was wrong. Are you still — and if I heard probably, you are still planning in reducing your debt. So what is the net leverage target then?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

We’ve maintained kind of a target level of 2 times, Rosemarie. We’ve been around that 2.1 times for a while. I think as we went through the second and the third quarter, as we viewed kind of the economy and what was happening, we felt prudent, as I said, to make sure that we had a very strong balance sheet and the priority was that. And so we put most of the free cash flow, the $40 million in the third quarter to debt repayment, a bit to shareholders. We’re comfortable with where our debt position is. We could make some additional debt payments going forward, but again that balance sheet that we have gives us a lot of options to make sure that our debt’s in the right position, we can steer our cash to shareholders, but also making sure we have resources for our growth opportunities. So we have a lot of options here. We might steer a little bit more to our debt, given where we are in the economy, but we take that balanced approach and we’re going to continue to do so.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Okay, thanks. And now, looking at your consumer-driven markets, revenues into those markets, overall, are now 25% and you are targeting that level to grow to 35% to 40%, if my memory serves me right, and that would include test doubling, going from $200 million to $400 million. So can you talk about the timing? And whether most of that growth is going to come from internal growth or whether in M&A is actually the biggest chunk getting you to your goal?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, I think you’re, Rosemarie, referring to a question maybe from the last call. I think we answered how big could our consumer-oriented businesses be. Look, I think it could grow to that size. I think we’re certainly — our strategy around creating balance in the company from an industrial and consumer standpoint, as you mentioned, we’re currently about 25% consumer-oriented, and we look to grow some of our core positions. So I think we’re vertically integrated in our Pet Care business and a couple of years ago we added to that with an acquisition called Sivomatic which doubled that Pet Care business. I think you saw that the organic growth of that business is at 11%.

And so we think that a large portion of those businesses, our Edible Oil Purification, our Animal Health business, our Pet Care business, our Fabric Care businesses, those will continue to grow and we continue to develop new products and ensure that we have the right capital base there to have healthy returns. We will continue to grow those organically and I think there’s opportunities out there for us to continue to add to our consumer-oriented product base to expand that I think. Could it get to 30%, 35%? Sure. That’s going to be both a combination of growing our current core positions organically and adding to them inorganically. And so over time, I think that’s a possibility to get to those types of levels. But we’re certainly focused on growing those product lines — these core product lines that we have in those consumer-oriented products.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Could you get to that level faster just by reshuffling your portfolio of businesses, meaning that divesting some non-consumer related operations?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

On a percentage growth, yes, that could — that would do it. I think, at the moment, I think we’re looking — at the moment, yes, that would do it. But at the moment, we’re looking more toward adding and growing those businesses organically and potentially inorganically.

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Okay, thanks.

Operator

All right. And your next question is from Mike Harrison with Seaport Global Securities.

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

Hi, good morning.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Hi, Mike.

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

I was wondering if we could talk about the HPC business, you said Pet Care was up 11%, but the business was flat overall on a year-over-year basis. So what’s going on outside of Pet Care? Was there some destocking or maybe declines from surge buying that was happening earlier in the pandemic?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Yeah, that — the — that business product line is Household Personal Care & Specialty, and in that Specialty segment, there is some kind of high-end additives for drilling products, so both in construction drilling and oil and gas drilling. And that was the one product line that has been off, mostly that oil and gas drilling, those additives for oil and gas drilling. So I believe every other portion of that product line had grown over last year, with the exception of that.

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

Right. And then within the Paper PCC business, have you seen any of your printing and writing paper customers getting some benefits from colleges and schools getting back to some in-person learning or has that not provided much pick up and until we get totally in-person, we don’t see that improvements?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

I think that some of what’s behind the demand growth recently — I’ll pass it over to D.J., I think the majority of our growth from the third — through the third quarter was really due to restarts. We had a number of shutdowns in the second quarter for entire entire months. So India, government restrictions and shutdowns for almost part of April and May. We had some shutdowns in South Africa and some of our plants in Europe. And so those restarted in the third quarter, which was really driving through that growth. I do think there is some demand improvement. I’ll let D.J. Monagle talk more to that about our conversations with customers. D.J. are you there?

D.J. Monagle, III — Group President, Specialty Minerals and Refractories

Yeah, I am, Doug. So, Mike, the way we’re — to generalize the statement, Doug is spot on that what we’ve been seeing is really just restarting and coming up from the shutdown. There is a general optimism that as more and more schools come online and more businesses get to work that operating rates will improve. Just to give you a perspective on this, the operating rates as we went into 2020 were in the neighborhood of just below 90%, so somewhere between 85% and 90% and North America was right at 90%, Europe was a little bit lower than that. So as things are coming back up, most people feel that North America is going to be back into that 80-plus percent operating rate. Europe seems to be a little bit slower.

And the big question on everyone’s mind is, they know that going back to work or they feel that as people return to the offices and more and more people go into the schools, because a lot of schools are working on these hybrid things, that paper consumption will grow. What the question mark is, is how do the habits — how do the long-term habits change based on this pandemic? And there is a school of thought that says the longer that this lasts, the more likely people are going to be transitioning to more, I guess, electronic methods of keeping their data or doing their work. So there is a big question, but what we’ve seen is about getting people back to work and having the shutdowns stop. But there is still a big question on long-term demand, especially in North America and Europe.

And then in Asia, the demand picture is the same, but for us, our growth story is more about penetration and that’s — that continues to move forward. Does that help, Mike?

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

Absolutely. Very helpful. And then last question I have is on the Refractories business. It seems like utilization rates are starting to approach the 70% level. I feel like 80% is more the magic number where these mills feel like they can run efficiently and profitably. Do you guys see 80% or 70% or any specific utilization rate as a magic number in terms of a pickup in your Refractories sales?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Let me start and then I’ll ask Brett Argirakis to comment. Historically, in this business, we thought that like an 85% rate was necessary for this business to be really strong in terms of operating income. We’ve changed this business tremendously over the past couple years from a margin contribution, margin technology, its portfolio of products. And so I think you saw last year, in the mid-70s, late in the first quarter, mid-70s, this business is still very profitable. So we’ve changed that kind of — the profile of the business over time. Brett, why don’t you talk a little bit about what you see in the marketplace and where you think our operating rates are going based on what you hear from our customers?

Brett Argirakis — Vice President and Managing Director, Minteq International Inc. and MTI Global Supply Chain

Sure, sure. Thanks, Mike. Yeah, right now, looking at the market conditions, all regions, of course, has shown reduced rates from prior year, but all showing gradual improvements. Doug and Matt both pointed out automotive is improving really to pre-COVID levels. In NAFTA, we’re seeing steel and scrap prices in North America and Europe increasing, which is definitely beneficial to the steel industry and right now, the U.S. just continues to show signs of getting back up to those — to the better levels. Right now, it’s just under 70%. For the past couple of years, we’ve seen 80%, which was very healthy. At 80%, it gives the steelmaker plenty of time to do maintenance, but also at a very healthy rate. I would anticipate that these rates will continue to gradually improve. But as Doug pointed out, 80% would be great to get back to, and I think we can get there, assuming no further setbacks from COVID. But, overall, we are positioned pretty well to operate even if we don’t hit the 80% rate and continue on.

There is also steel capacity that’s coming on, new plants. These new plants are starting up between the fourth quarter and through 2021, which we’re very well aligned to continue to expand with them. They both — Doug pointed out some of the new business growth that will be moving along with them in both refractory and metallurgical line. So, yeah, I think we have a really good chance to get back to some reasonable rates and if not 80%, we’re positioned well, Mike.

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

All right, thanks very much.

Operator

All right. And we’ll take the next question from David Silver with CL King.

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

Yeah, hi, good morning. Thank you. Actually, I should say good afternoon. So, I had a couple of like targeted questions here. Early on in your comments, Doug, you mentioned regarding the 11% increase in Pet Care sales this quarter year-over-year and sequential. You made a reference to partnering. And I have to confess I’ve never come across that before and also — sorry, come across that before in your commentary, and the 11% I think is significantly higher than maybe the 3% to 5% or 4% to 6% kind of numbers you’ve been targeting for that business for a long time.

So, maybe just a little bit of color on, are you doing anything differently? Are these partnerships a little bit different? And what would be the ultimate potential to increase partnering opportunities in terms of growing that part of your Pet Care business? Thanks.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Sure. Thanks, David. I think when I referred to partnering, we talk about — we are a private label pet care supplier, and so partnering is producing brands for others for their shelves. And so when talking about partnering, we’ve been partnering with new customers around the world. We have a growing business in China. Our business in Sivomatic continues to grow its solid rates in Europe and continuing to come up — and supply new brands to new partners there as well. I think the other comments were, as we move and as you see the consumer buying behavior to be more online, we’re also looking at — and have started some online channels for our sales.

So there’s a number of different partnering things that are going, and that’s not just — and that’s around the world. Those online channels are global, and our main regions. So when I talk about partnering, it’s that. It’s being able to partner by being able to provide brands for those who want to work with us and our vertically integrated position as a supplier.

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

Okay. Sorry, I didn’t associate the partnering with private label. But thank you for clarifying that. I wanted to maybe shift over to that PCC business in particular and in particular the volume growth that you cited in China this quarter. I think it was 18% or so. But I was scratching my head and I’m trying to kind of relate that growth this quarter with the upcoming new project for Chenming, which I guess has not started up.

And I was wondering if you could characterize the full growth, all of the growth in China as related to the legacy satellite units you have there, or might there have been some product produced at other locations, but may be shipped over to the Chenming location, maybe to get things started there ahead of your full-scale start up. So in other words, was any — was that all — was the growth in China all related to legacy plants or was this somehow part of it — part of the growth related to Chenming, I guess, maybe pre-production or pre-start-up volumes that are may be required?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

That — the growth — year-over-year growth in China was all from our legacy operating facilities there. So we saw some strong demand year-over-year from our legacy. So, to give you an example, the Chenming facility will be about 150,000 metric ton facility coming online — that has not come online, so none of those volumes came from that facility. That should be commissioned in December and ramping up through kind of the first quarter of next year. To give you an idea, our installed base of capacity in China is probably 850,000-ish tons and Chenming will represent another 150,000 tons, so bringing us to close to 1 million tons of capacity in Asia so — in China. So when you see that 18% growth and we’re adding another almost 16%, 17% to our capacity base, which we think ramps up next year, that’s why we are very enthusiastic about our growth in Asia and the Paper business because of that penetration story.

And then also in India as we’re building — ramping up one and another facility next year. So as D.J. talked about, those opportunities and penetration are really driving our growth in this business in Asia. That’s where it’s coming from. So we see those type of growth numbers continuing through next year in Asia, David. Hopefully, that helps.

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

Yeah, yeah. Thank you. So 1 million metric — sorry, 1 million tons installed out of some — you’ll have a little bit over 3 million total and that’s kind of China share of your overall installed base.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

I think the 1 million tons installed is in — it’s kind of our Asia base, 1 million tons in Asia, and the majority of that’s been in — the majority of that’s been in China. However, India has been growing very quickly over the past five years.

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

Okay and then just maybe one other question, this time on the foundry business. But for many quarters now you’ve been highlighting the growth in China related to the custom blends that you offer there, and again, just probably a gap in my understanding, but should I assume that the types of products, the custom blends that you sell in China are similar to the ones that are marketed regularly to, let’s say, North America or western Europe? Or is it the case where customers in other regions, maybe like to blend their own? In other words, is the value proposition the same in China as it is in North America and Europe or either due to custom or the types of products you’re selling, is it qualitatively or quantitatively different as you go region to region?

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

It’s not. It’s very much the same in terms of concept. And so I guess they’re not exactly the same formulas and the reason behind that is because we are tailoring a formula to that customer’s equipment, what they’re trying to make, the quality requirements and dimensions of that cast product. And so — but being able to develop a system and a blend and an additive blend that meets the requirements to help them whether it’s through their scrap — reduce their scrap rates to very low levels to improve the throughput through those casting machines, we’re able to tailor that. So the blends may not be exactly the same, but that is our value proposition, being able to, from a technical standpoint, go in really deeply understand and help that foundry improve many aspects, reduce cost, improve quality and then be able to deliver that blend kind of real-time.

I mean, in North America, we’re delivering trucks on an hourly basis to our customers — our foundry customers. It’s that and if they have an issue, they can pick up the phone and talk to us. Our technical experts will go through and make sure we understand what the change we can make — what the issue is, we can make a change to our blend and deliver it on the next truck. It’s that level of capability and it’s exactly the type of value proposition, the technical capability and the know-how that we’re developing around the world and China. That’s what’s driving kind of a lot of our growth in China.

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

Okay, great, thank you very much.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] All right. It appears there are no further questions at this time. I’d now like to turn the conference back to Mr. Dietrich for any closing remarks.

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Thank you very much. I do appreciate everybody joining the call today and I hope everyone and your families remain safe. Thank you again.

Operator

[Operator Closing Remarks]

Duration: 71 minutes

Call participants:

Erik Aldag — Head of Investor Relations

Douglas T. Dietrich — Chief Executive Officer

Matthew E. Garth — Senior Vice President, Finance and Treasury, and Chief Financial Officer

D.J. Monagle, III — Group President, Specialty Minerals and Refractories

Brett Argirakis — Vice President and Managing Director, Minteq International Inc. and MTI Global Supply Chain

Daniel Moore — CJS Securities, Inc. — Analyst

Silke Kueck — J.P. Morgan — Analyst

Jonathan J. Hastings — Minerals Technologies, Inc. — Group President, Performance Materials

Rosemarie Morbelli — G. Research — Analyst

Mike Harrison — Seaport Global Securities — Analyst

David Silver — CL King — Analyst

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PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan on making PS5 more successful than PS4
Oct 29 2020
PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan on making PS5 more successful than PS4

Over the past few weeks, PlayStation head Jim Ryan has received more than his usual share of emails.

From the moment PS5 sold out (within minutes), there’s been people clamouring to get hold of one for launch day, and who better to help them get one than the guy in charge? That bit is not surprising. Ryan has been around for the launch of every PlayStation there has ever been — he’s used to this.

But what has taken PlayStation’s CEO by surprise are the types of people who are sending the emails.

“Since the pre-orders went live, every day I open my inbox to some very emotional and heart-wrenching emails from lots of people,” Ryan says. “But so many of them are from people in the mid-50s, who say they’ve been a PlayStation gamer since 1995, and they’re asking us to help them get hold of a PS5.

“With PS4, we were coming out of a very lacklustre PS3 platform… Now we are starting with 100 million gamers”

“I am astonished at the number of people who are like that and writing to me. It’s really taken me back. It’s indicating that demographically the age profile is expanding rapidly with each generation. And at the same time, I get emails from really young gamers, frequently beautifully written… better written often than the 53 year-old gamers. They’re just as passionate, just as interested and just as excited by PlayStation as somebody who is old enough to be their father, maybe even their grandfather.”

This isn’t Ryan gloating about the sheer popularity of the PlayStation brand; it’s actually part of a conversation about how PlayStation 5 might be able outsell PlayStation 4, which has now shipped almost 114 million consoles worldwide. Sony CFO Hiroki Totoki said during the company’s second quarter earnings call that the company is “committed” to surpassing what PS4 has achieved. That’s not going to be an easy feat.

Ryan’s anecdote about his inbox highlights the opportunity he sees of different age groups playing on PlayStation. Yet I countered his story with one of my own. I’m in my mid-30s, and all of my friends who spent their youth playing Metal Gear Solid and Crash Bandicoot are now busy with careers and kids. Very few of them are even considering a PlayStation 5 as a result.

PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan

The phenomena of people ‘ageing out’ of games consoles is a very real one in my world right now, and that’s perhaps one reason why there hasn’t been a huge amount of audience growth for the console industry over the past 20 years.

“First of all, I think — and this is hypothesis — but maybe some of the 50 year-olds [who emailed me] did tune out for a few years while they were having their kids and growing up, and then came back to us when they had more time and money,” Ryan suggests. “A lot of this comes down to the stickiness and tribal nature of the community that we create. That sense of community probably didn’t exist to the same extent. It certainly existed, but it was more two mates sitting on a couch playing FIFA together, which by its very definition required a physical proximity, and was therefore harder to organise.

PS5 launches next month

“We have the data to support this — the networked nature of entertainment these days allows for communities to be massively more sticky, and kind-of homogeneous. The concept of stickiness is that once you’re stuck it’s hard to unstick. That probably gives us an opportunity to retain those people, where in the past maybe they’ve gone.”

We have been speaking about how PS5 might outsell PS4, but install base is actually quite an outdated way of judging the performance of a console. If we measure success by install base alone, then PlayStation peaked over a decade ago with its PS2.

“It’s become a lot more nuanced,” Ryan agrees. “For example, one reference point, we sold a lot of PS2s, but many of them were at $99, on a format that was very, very heavily pirated. Right now the metric is engagement, and that obviously can be judged across two axis: the number of people who engage with you, and the amount of time that each of those people spend engaging with you.

“We are increasingly bullish in terms of the number of people that we think may engage with PS5. Firstly, because we don’t begin from a standing start like we did with PS4, when we were coming out of a very lacklustre PS3 platform, with a low level of networking across the community. Now we are starting with 100 million gamers, who we hope to transition very, very rapidly onto PS5. And it’s an engaged, tribal, networked community, who will be deeply and profoundly engaged with their PlayStation 5, we hope, from a very early moment.

“The work we’ve done with female protagonists, we see that resulting in increased presence of the female demographic within the PlayStation community”

“The second is that the PS5 has been built as a networked device, with features and functionality coming out of the experience from the last six or seven years, designed to give networked gamers a better, richer, deeper, faster, more seamless network gaming experience. I’m sure you’ve seen the [PS5] UX unveil — which is very difficult to do remotely, but I think the guys did a pretty good job… All of those adjectives that I used just earlier, they were in mind when we designed that UX.”

Install base isn’t the only measure of success for PlayStation 5, but it is clearly an important one. There is still that goal for PS5 to outsell PS4, and it’s going to be a challenge. PS4 may have arrived on the back of a disappointing PS3, but it also launched while its direct competitors at Microsoft and Nintendo were floundering.

Ryan says the expanding demographics and “stickiness” of the PlayStation experience is one way in which it’ll bring in more customers. But there are other opportunities.

“A lot of the work that we’ve done with female protagonists in gaming, we definitely see that resonating and resulting in increased presence of the female demographic within the PlayStation community,” he says. “And then there’s obviously geography. The PS4 generation saw us make huge strides in Germany and the Middle East, and I think there is further progress to be made in both of those areas. But equally, I think Asia — outside of Japan — has huge potential for us. And Latin America has huge potential for us.”

The geographical reach of PlayStation is already very strong. The brand has a significant presence in markets where its competitors barely touch, including parts of Eastern Europe. And it’s an advantage the business plans to make the most of.

“When I was in charge of Europe, we had a pretty clear template for the way that we would open up markets,” Ryan continues. “Some markets opened up faster than others. Germany took some time, but we got there. Middle East, some parts of that were very difficult, but we got there. Having very competent, on-the-ground teams with simple but focused distribution, and proper investment in the brand and proper marketing, can quite quickly yield significant dividends.

Sony announced it would acquire Insomniac last year

“Latin America in particular can be very difficult. Currencies, import tariffs… very complicated geopolitical situations in a lot of countries. I won’t pretend that it will be easy, but when you look at the statistics, the maths of it, there are definitely opportunities that we should seek to exploit.”

With the launch of PS5 just a few weeks away, much of the conversation has focused on the future of that platform. It’s going to be a big launch. Ryan reiterates the fact that there will be more PS5s at launch than PS4s — “Considering everything we’ve had to contend with, that’s a considerable achievement,” he says, referring to the COVID-19 pandemic.

But PS4 will remain an important platform for a while yet. There are over 100 million customers on that device, and recent hits like The Last of Us: Part 2 show how engaged that audience remains. In fact, with the coronavirus pandemic, the PS4 install base is as engaged as it’s ever been. It’s no wonder that Sony is planning to make several of its upcoming titles playable across both PS4 and PS5.

“Obviously, our eyes and our horizons have lifted with regards to what’s possible with that PS4 community, based on what we’ve observed over the last six months,” Ryan says, referring to an increase in players as a result of COVID-19 lockdowns. “That can be quite powerful, because in 2021, 2022… that PS4 community that we’ve spoken about, they will be the vast majority of people on PlayStations during that time. It is crucial that we keep them engaged and happy. And the last six months have demonstrated that we could do that to an extent that we didn’t think possible when we were setting our minds pre-COVID.”

“I invite anybody to look at the launch window line-up of PS4, or PS3, and compare it to what we are going to bring on PS5. There’s no comparison”

If launching a new console during a pandemic wasn’t tough enough, the other challenge for PlayStation is the competition. Nintendo is in a strong position right now, whereas Xbox has been rapidly buying new studios to ensure it can capture more customers for its Game Pass subscription service.

Microsoft’s acquisition of Bethesda for $7.5 billion raised a few eyebrows, but it’s really just a headline moment for an industry that’s been consolidating for some time. More games companies have been going public and using those funds to go and acquire, while giants like Microsoft and Tencent have been actively seeking teams to buy. Sony, too, has been getting involved with its $229 million acquisition of Spider-Man developer Insomniac.

Ryan says that more acquisitions are possible, but he was eager to remind us that Sony’s existing studios have grown considerably over the last generation.

“It’s probably not widely appreciated or understood, to what extent that we have grown our own game development capability organically over the course of this generation,” he says. “Obviously, it’s been helped by the acquisition of Insomniac, and it’s wonderful to have them as part of the family. I would just invite anybody to look at the launch window line-up of the PS4 generation, or PS3 generation, and compare it to what we are going to bring in the equivalent phase of PS5. There’s just no comparison.

“That is the fruit of not massive spending sprees, but of very, very steadily, carefully planned organic growth. Probably the best example I give… I could obviously talk about Naughty Dog, but they’ve always been making great games. But let’s talk about Ghost of Tsushima, which has been a critical delight and certainly a commercial delight to an extent that we didn’t think it would be. That speaks volumes to the work that Sucker Punch has done to build on their previous canon of work.

“We are lucky enough to have five or six studios who fall into that category… But it isn’t luck, because we’ve been working on this for years and years. Very quietly, in a very PlayStation way, we’ve been building something quite special with these studios. You can do it with frenzied acquisition, or measured acquisition, or you can do it organically.”

With changes across the industry, reinvigorated competitors, a global pandemic, and a troubling economic situation, PS5 arrives at a strange moment for the world and the video games business. But with a promising line-up for the next 12 months, and an engaged group of PS4 players to pull in, Ryan remains positive over what Sony’s new machine will deliver.

“It’s really exciting now,” he concludes. “We are right on the brink. Everybody is four or five years into this, and it’s really great to be so close to the big moment. You know, I’ve done them all, and this has easily been the most extraordinary of any of them.”

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Cheap EU chicken presents grave human health risk: report
Oct 28 2020
Cheap EU chicken presents grave human health risk: report

A new report published by the non-governmental organization (NGO) Germanwatch on Tuesday outlines alarming levels of antimicrobial-resistant pathogens in chicken sold by Europe’s three largest poultry producers.    

The study was carried out on chicken produced by the companies and purchased from Aldi, Lidl and other discount supermarkets across Europe — in France, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands and Spain — as well as from the producers themselves.

Overall, Germanwatch researchers found that the most contaminated chickens were produced by Germany’s PHW Group, which butchers roughly 4.5 million chickens per week (59% of samples tested), followed by France’s LDC Group (57%) and the Netherlands’ Plukon Food Group (36%).

Read more:    What is antibiotic resistance?

Renders antibiotics useless when you need them

The threat posed by the presence of such pathogens is that humans may become infected while handling or consuming the tainted meat, yet the presence of antimicrobials in the chicken effectively renders antibiotics useless in fighting the infection.

The World Health Organization (WHO) says that critically important antimicrobials (CIA HP) like quinolones are of primary importance to human health. This group of antibiotics is used as a last line of defense when all other antibiotics prove ineffective. The Germanwatch report found traces of CIA HP in 35% of its samples.

The report points out that a lack of uniform EU rules has allowed the grave health risk of antibiotic-resistant pathogens in meat to flourish across Europe. Germanwatch argues that the tests show “the need for an EU-wide ban on CIA HP antibiotics in industrial livestock production.”

The group argues that such antibiotics should be reserved for human use only and have no place in food production. Resistance rates in the US, says the NGO, have decreased significantly since the use of quinolones in poultry production was banned in 2005.

There are other ways

The Germanwatch report suggests that beyond banning the use of specific antibiotics, producers should practice more animal-friendly husbandry, thus avoiding the need to administer them in the first place.

The report’s authors conclude by advising consumers to “avoid cheap chicken and switch to organic products from smaller, farm-based livestock farms,” where few or no traces of antibiotics are to be found.

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