Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. A warm welcome to the RFG annual results presentation for the year ended the 2nd of October 2022. I will cover the review of the year after which Tiaan Schoombie, our CFO, will cover the financial performance. After which I will continue to do a trading review and then also have a discussion about sustainability, our capital investments, some comments on our strategy and outlook, after which we will gladly answer some questions. If we look at the year, we saw strong regional and international sales growth, specifically on the international business, a good recovery driven by robust growth in export volumes due to the higher global demand. We also saw some pleasing resilient regional performance in a very constrained consumer environment. We successfully integrated our Today business, where we primarily focused on restoring profitability, where we had multiple rounds of price increases to recover the exorbitant cost increases, and we saw some margin recovery from October 2022. We saw significantly to cost inflation in the past year, and it mainly impacted our canned meat, vegetable and pie categories, where our regional margin was under pressure due to the impact and recovery of prices. We did however see some margin recovery which started in the late part of this financial year. With regards to our international business, we saw a good recovery in profitability, where we managed to secure some good pricing in international currencies, and we managed to recover significant cost increases in the world. Obviously, we got a big benefit also from the weaker rand. If we look at our progress against our medium term targets that we have set for ourselves. With regards to revenue growth, our target being GDP plus CPI + 2%, which for the year ended just over 11%, We managed to achieve a 21.9% growth in total revenue. If we take out the acquisition of the Today business, it was a 19.4% growth, which I think was a very good performance. If we look at the operating profit margin, our target is 10%. We saw an increase in the operating profit margin by 160 basis points to 7.99%, which was also a pleasing performance, moving closer towards that target of 10%. If we look at our return on equity, where our target is WAC + 2%, which ended up at 16.1% for the year. We also had a good increase from 8.1% in the prior year to 12.5% in the current financial year. I'm now gonna hand over to Tiaan Schoombie, our CFO, who will handle the financial performance, after which I will continue with the trade review. Thank you. Tiaan. Good morning, everyone. I'm just gonna talk to some of the financial highlights of the year. Strong organic growth of 21.9% to a total revenue of ZAR 7.3 billion for the year. That was on the back of regional growth of 13.5% and international revenue growth of 57.4%. Once, of course, that impact the re-results for the year, or rather once off items. Firstly, we received an insurance settlement for loss of profits during the 2020 lockdown due to COVID of ZAR 43 million. That income came through in the first half of the financial year. Then there was ZAR 26 million restructuring costs relating to the Today acquisition, of which about ZAR 21 million also came through in the first half of the financial year. The regional margin was unfortunately adversely impacted by the cost pressure on canned goods, and some operational challenges at the meat plant, as well as the Today impact of the Today integration and also significant cost increases in raw materials in the pie category specifically. That all resulted in a decline in operating profits for the regional segment of ZAR 89 million for the year. Despite that, the international segment more than compensated for that. The operating profit for the group for the year was 54% higher at ZAR 574 million. The operating margin accordingly is improved by 160 basis points to 7.9%. The international profit increased by ZAR 202 million compared to the prior year. As a result, the EBITDA increased by 33.6%, with the margin improving to 11.3%. Headline earnings increased by 36.9% to ZAR 361 million. Diluted headline earnings per share was 37.3% better at ZAR 1.37 per share. The dividend policy of three times cover of diluted headline earnings per share was maintained, and a cash dividend of ZAR 0.458 per share was declared by the board of directors. In terms of revenue growth since the 2018 financial year, give a compounded growth rate of 9.8% over the period. For the same period until the end of 2021, it was 6.7%. What is also obvious from the graph is the big increase in the international revenue, as mentioned earlier. The drivers of revenue growth for the group. Volume growth contributed 5.5%. Mix was negative at 2.1%. Price inflation was positive 14.1%. Currency changes contributed 2% to the growth in revenue, while the acquisition of Today accounted for 2.5% of the growth. If one breaks it down in the two halves of the financial year, in the first half, volume growth was 12.5%. In the second half, it was just below being neutral year on year at negative 0.8%. Importantly, as Pieter has said, we started to recover some of the input costs that we had to absorb during the year in the second half, as can be seen from this graph there, 6.8% price mix changes in the first half, but 16.6% in the second half. Currency contributed 3.7% of the growth in the second half, as did the acquisition, more in the second half obviously, because it was included for the full six months versus only two months in the first half, 3.4% there. Excluding the impact of currency and acquisition, revenue in the first half grew by 19.3% and in the second half, 15.8%. Volumes did come off in the second half, but was more than compensated for by price increases. An analysis of revenue over the last three years just show that since 2020, the normal pattern has established itself again, whereby the second half is always a bigger contributor to total revenue for the year. Normalized operating profit and in the current year, what is excluded from the reported operating profit of ZAR 574 million is the insurance proceeds and a small impairment loss of ZAR 1 million. That is excluded, which brings it to ZAR 533 million. In the prior year, what was excluded was acquisition cost of ZAR 4 million, ZAR 16 million impairment loss, and ZAR 27 million insurance bill. Electricity bill, sorry, for relating to years before 2021. A breakdown between the segments, the two segments of the normalized operating profit. What stands out is obviously the performance by international in the current year, where it has totally underperformed in the four years prior to the current year. Earnings and dividend, as we can see, ZAR 1.37, and the dividend of ZAR 0.458 is significantly better than any of the prior years. Analysis of international revenue. The split by currency shows a swing towards US dollars. We've seen it at the interim results already. At the expense of GBP, also a lot of the additional tip revenue in the year came from markets where the US dollar is the currency in which the trade takes place. To the right, the average exchange rates. What's important there is despite the GBP and EUR being weaker against the ZAR or the ZAR stronger against those currencies in the second half, the US dollar was significantly stronger or the ZAR weaker to the US dollar in the second half. Which is important to bear in mind when one analyze the international results, because most of the raw materials is bought and paid for in the first half, obviously at an average rate of ZAR 15.20, while most of the sales take place in the second half at a much better exchange rate from an exporter point of view. The impact on the current year's revenue of the weaker rand against the basket of currencies was a gain of ZAR 118 million compared to a loss of ZAR 136 million in the prior year. In terms of working capital, a satisfactory performance given what the position was at the time of the interim results. Net working capital turnover improved to 25% from 26.2% the prior year. Net working capital days, better at a net 115 days. The big improvement came on the inventory line. Trade receivables and trade payables were affected by the additional week that was included in the year. Net-net it is basically a number that is to be expected. Free cash flow of ZAR 253 million. It's only ZAR 6 million better than the prior year. Two... Despite additional ZAR 162 million cash generated, additional income tax payments amounting to ZAR 65 million and maintenance CapEx increasing by ZAR 53 million are the main contributors or the main absorbers of the additional cash that was generated. Capital management in the group. A dividend was paid amounting to ZAR 76 million and expansion CapEx during the year amounted to ZAR 78 million. ZAR 54 million went towards payment for the Today business. ZAR 150 million loans were raised during the year, at the same time, ZAR 92 million went towards repayments of long-term loans. Lease payments of ZAR 35 million and other items of ZAR 15 million gave rise to a net decrease in the bank overdraft at year-end of by ZAR 53 million. In terms of ratios, given the good performance, net debt to equity as well as net debt to EBITDA improved significantly from the prior year. Return on equity equally improved from 8.1% last year to 12.5%. The negative here is obviously free cash flow return, which is an area of focus for management. Thank you, Pieter. Thank you very much, Tiaan, for the financial performance and also showing us the indicators. If you look at our business, we aim to be a supplier of choice for convenience meal solutions, where we look at specifically at our regional long life foods, regional fresh foods, and our international business. Operate in the following product categories, being canned fruit and vegetables, jams, bottles, salads and pickles, long life fruit juices, fruit purees, baby foods, canned meats, and dry packed goods. In fresh foods side, we operate within the ready meals category, pies and pastry products, dairy, bakery and snacks and dairy products. In our international segment, we do canned foods, fruit snacks in plastic cups, long life fruit juices, and industrial pulps and purees. Our market offering is that we've got a diversified product portfolio. We've got a combination of own brands and private label ranges for all major domestic retailers. In the fresh food side, we have got a long-term partnership with Woolworths. We distribute our own pie brands and we've got a national pie supply agreement with Engen. In the international side of our business, we are a long-term supplier to global retail and premium branded customers. Just looking at our segmental revenue, where the regional long life foods makes up 46%, in fresh foods 29%, our international business 25%. If we look at our international business, our contribution increased from 19% in the prior year to 25% due to strong volume growth, improved pricing, and also the benefit of the weaker exchange rates. In long life foods, the revenue contribution was impacted by growth in international and the acquisition of the Today business, which is part of our fresh foods segment. Fresh foods includes the contribution from the Today acquisition. Just looking at private label, we've got a dual strategy of growing our branded portfolio, as well as manufacturing private label ranges for major retailers. If we look at the graphs on the top, private label accounts for 55% of group revenue. International is 100% and our regional business 42%. If you look at the comparative figure for 2021, it was 44%. RFG also produces private label products in categories where own brands have a strong presence, which ensure greater participation for us in the category. If we look at the regional performance, for the year against the prior year, you see a revenue increase of 13.5%, where long life contributed 9.9% and our fresh foods business 19.9%, which I think was a good performance. Unfortunately, on the operating profit side, we had a decline, as Tiaan mentioned, from ZAR 412 million to ZAR 323 million, and our operating profit margin declined from 8.6% to 5.9%. The drivers of the revenue growth was volume, and also, as was mentioned, price up 10.7%, negative mix of 2.7%, also, acquisition of 3.1%. We then also look at the graph on the right-hand corner, we would see a growth over the last five years, average growth rate of 8.1%. Although we saw in the regional performance a decline, it also shows the opportunity that we've got in our business. Just to give a bit of insight on the performance for the past year, and looking at specific categories. Looking at fruit juices, it was the main revenue driver for us in long life foods, and it also contributed to an increased market share. We look at our herbs and spices category, we also continued to achieve good growth and customer response to the Heinz brand. On the canned meat side, we had a decline in volumes owing to increased cost of cans and also our raw materials. We also had operational channel challenges at the meat plant, mainly due to load shedding, impacting our electricity and also the water supply. The volumes was impacted by the high base in the prior year when our competitor experienced some quality issues, and we saw exorbitant increases in raw and packaging material. On the ready meal side, we saw a resilient performance in the constrained consumer environment, where we continued to achieve some good volume growth. We look at the pie category, we are seeing that our volumes are starting to recover. Our margins were under pressure owing to meat price inflation. We saw some margin recovery from October with multiple price increases that we had to put through in the marketplace to recover the enormous cost increases. Just a couple of comments on the Today acquisition. We generated revenue of ZAR 147.2 million for the eight months since acquisition. We saw some once off costs, as Tiaan mentioned, of ZAR 25.7 million, which resulted in a loss of ZAR 7.7 million. We rationalized some of the SKUs as part of our plan to restore the profitability, and we see that the Today business is well-positioned ahead of the first festive season, trading period in the group, and we're encouraged about the growth prospects for that part of our business as we are comfortable with what we have managed to achieve after taking over the business the first of February, in this financial year. Looking at the rest of Africa, we sell our product in 12 other African countries, where our sales of our long life foods into the rest of Africa increased by 14.5% to ZAR 414 million. It accounts for about 12.3% of our regional long life sales. Our main growth drivers are fruit juice, canned meat, and dry foods, where we've got the long-term relationships with major distributors and customers in Africa. If we also look at the graph, the last five years, we managed an average growth rate of 10.7%, which is very pleasing. If we look at our market shares, just maybe one or two comments. We maintained our positions in all our categories, and we saw some strong growth in fruit juices following the recovery of the 200 ml pack size, which during the COVID period, showed huge declines. If you look at all those categories, specifically jams, canned fruit and canned meat and meals, where we still are the number one in those specific categories. If you look at long life fruit juices specifically, increased our market share to 28%, which was really a very pleasing performance. Brand shares in canned food categories normalized after the recall of canned products by our biggest competitor in July to September 2021. Managed to keep our number one shares in canned pineapple and canned tomatoes, and also number two positions in the other categories. Looking at those brand shares where we saw some good share gains. Looking at the 100% fruit juice category, managed to get to a 20% share, being a very strong number two, and also important to see our spices, herbs and ketchup category, where we increased our share to 7% and are now in a number three position. Product innovation obviously of critical importance for us. We've got some ongoing newness, which is a key driver of sales and market share growth. We do lateral brand extensions into adjacent categories. We saw the entry of the Rhodes brand into the food juice market about six, seven years ago, and having exceptional success, showing by our brand shares. We rebranded our Squish business, our Squish products to Rhodes Squish, and then we also launched into curry powder, the Heinz brand replacing Pakco. We've also had some range extensions and product upgrades through innovation. We had some range extensions, upgrades. We also had some flavor extensions and reformulations and some new packaging formats and sizes. We also look at the global health and eating trends, growing environmental consciousness, broadening lifestyle food choices, and also looking at the increasing plant-based eating habits. Just some examples of some product innovations, some brand extensions. As I made mention, moving the Heinz brand extended into califo, rebranded from Pakco, and also some range extensions in the dry goods category through new packaging formats and sizes. Some extensions in the fruit juice category, where we launched some new flavors and also introduced some new products into some of our retailers. Also looking at the healthy eating and lifestyle trends, where we increase our product range and also some plant-based products that we've launched. If you look at the international, at our international segment, I think an important note is that we previously made mention that we are focusing extremely hard on our revenue management. Meaning that we would like to expand our business, in more parts of the world and spreading our risk a bit and also with that strategy, looking at opportunities for us to sell our product quicker, to ship our products quicker. We... You would have seen if compared to the previous year, we've increased our presence in South America from 3.5% in the prior year to 9% and also increased our Australasia business to 10% from the prior year. We then look at the performance, I think, a very pleasing performance on the international side increased our revenue with 57.4% to close to ZAR 1.8 billion, operating profit of ZAR 209 million, giving us the operating profit margin of 11.7% against 2021 of close to a breakeven. The drivers of revenue growth, volume up 18.3%, price and mix up 28.7% and Forex contributing 10.4%. Also pleasing to see the growth over the last five years of 16.1%. I think also very important from the margin perspective, we have made mention at previous presentations, we strive towards that 10% operating margin through the cycle and that is obviously going to be very important for us to ensure to see how we're going to do in the next year to come. I will make a bit of some comments later in that regard. Just a bit of a review of our business. In the past year, we have increased our production levels to meet the higher demand following the failure of last year's peach crop failure in Greece. From a port congestion perspective, we also saw some export growth benefited as congestion at the Cape Town port eased. We were fairly lucky with a bit of a tailwind that we managed in September. We really did exceptionally well with shipping off our containers, which obviously benefited a lot in this segment specifically. The port strike only happened in October. We were fairly lucky that that was after our financial year-end. We had a currency benefit where the rand weakened by 7.1% against trading currencies, resulted in revenue uplift of ZAR 118 billion. Our production levels, we plan to normalize it in 2023 after we accelerated it in FY 2022 due to the failure of the peach crop in Greece last year. Looking at our Eswatini pineapple production, our export volumes will be increased with the completion of the development of our new plantations. We expect that production will reach full capacity by FY 2024. Just a couple of comments on sustainability, which is close to our heart and important to our business. We've got an integrated ESG strategy which is aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, where we look at those specific areas. Just a couple of comments also on renewable energy. We focus on renewable energy. We've actually accelerated it due to the acceleration of load shedding. We're busy with installations of solar panels at our Fruit Drakenstein site, also at our vegetable plant in Mpophoma in Senani, and also our meat plant in Krugersdorp. We've also already have a solar installed at our fruit juice facility in Wellington, and we've also at our last board meeting, approved more solar, increasing our solar ability at the juice facility after we have put up a new warehouse. Also, we will continue in Fruit Drakenstein, where we also see some opportunity. We will also increase our solar installations. Looking at our environmental targets. Our environmental reduction targets has been set for 2025, and we measure our efficiency across the four pillars, which are energy, water, and waste management as well as greenhouse gas emissions. Exciting reductions in waste management, water and energy intensity was achieved in the 2022 financial year. Looking also at reducing food waste, where we are a signature to the National Food Loss and Waste Agreement and committed to reducing food waste by 50% by 2030. With regards to sustainability, reporting ranked fourth out of 16 companies in the food and beverage sector in the Sustainability Data Transparency Index, being the third most improved company on the JSE. Looking, a couple of comments on capital investment. Our capital investment obviously aims at generating efficiency gains. Our expenditure, as Theunis made mention, was ZAR 260 million for the 2022 financial year, of which maintenance expenditure made up ZAR 142 million. Our maintenance CapEx to turnover, a metric which we closely monitor as well, 2% up against 1.9% in prior. We plan to have capital investments in the next financial year of around ZAR 250 million. You see on the bottom the split between maintenance CapEx, expansion CapEx, and also the pineapple crops includes an estimated ZAR 50 million for our pineapple plantations. If you look at the production base, we've got a well-capitalized production base with capacity for growth. If you look at our major products in FY 2022, or I made mention of the new warehouse at our fruit juice plant in Wellington. We did the integration of our Today pie business. We've had some equipment upgrades at the Eswatini plant and two pie facilities in Hartene, and we completed our pineapple plantation expansion in Eswatini. As you would know, our 14 production facilities are located close to end markets and sources of raw materials. Just a couple of comments on our strategy and outlook. I made mention to say that we aim to be the supplier of choice for fresh, frozen and long life meat solutions in our selected markets, with our five strategic pillars being a diversified food group, value-added new solutions, market-leading brands, our partnerships with industry-leading customers, as well as, having world-class manufacturing facilities. Our strategic growth drivers, specifically from a diversified food group perspective, is we will continue to diversify our regional and international customer base. I made mention specifically of the revenue management of our international business, where we have increased our revenue in other parts of the world. We will continue to look at built-on acquisitions which are aligned to our core product categories, like the one that we did with Today, and continue with new product launches. If you look at value-added new solutions, as shown some stuff that we do, we'll continue our new product development and innovation range and platform with extensions across our brands, as well as new private label ranges for major food retailers. We will continue to drive sales in frozen pies and in the snacking categories. Looking at our market-leading brands, we'll continue to invest in them, specifically in areas of high growth. Further lateral product extensions, as was mentioned, and continue to grow our brand shares, particularly in categories recently entered through acquisition. I think we've also shown you some of our brand shares increase specifically in fruit juices and in the dry foods, which was extremely pleasing for us. If you look at the fourth pillar, our partnerships with industry leading customers, expanding our brands into selected Asian and African markets, and also opportunities, as was mentioned, in South America, and also increasing buy on brands export to U.S. retail and foodservice. Very important for us, our world-class manufacturing facilities. As I made mention, important the metric of maintenance to the maintenance spend. We will continue to invest in our facilities, enhancing our production efficiencies and ensure that we increase capacity where needed. Obviously, of critical importance is the global food safety certifications that we've got at these specific plants. My last slide is on driving shareholder value. I think four specific important metrics for us, which aligns with our goals that we've set ourselves. We will continue to drive revenue growth. We've got production capacity available at most of our facilities, and we will focus on specific growth categories, being fruit juices, dry goods, and with the increase in our pineapple production. We'll continue to seek opportunities for strategic value creative built-on acquisitions. I think very important for us is our operating margin expansion strategy. I think there's a big opportunity for us specifically here, where we need to focus on better price volume margin management in our regional business. We need to maintain our revenue margins. We need to ensure that international margin of 10% through the cycle, that we can achieve that. Very happy obviously with the margin that we managed to achieve for the current financial year, and we need to continue to increase efficiencies at our factories.Increase our return on equity, and there we will continue to drive profitability. The other metric which is of critical importance for us is looking at our cash flow management. Tiaan made mention of some of the metrics there. I think we had a fair performance there, an improved one against the prior year. We will continue to reduce raw and packaging stock holding after the COVID period, specifically where we had to increase raws and packaging material due to supply chain issues that we had. We need to continue to drive that timely international shipments. I think important to note also is it's very much part of the revenue management strategy for us to ensure that we can ship our products, quicker if we've got a bit, a better diversified, customer base. Looking at strategic capital allocation that ensures that we manage the returns that we want to achieve. Thank you very much. I think that ends our presentation. Tiaan and myself are happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you. Pieter, at this stage, we don't have any questions coming on the webcast. If anybody does have any questions after the presentation, they're welcome to send them through to us. Contact details are on the rfg.com website, and we'll respond to those questions as they come in. We're just refreshing the questions, and there don't appear to be any, Pieter. Okay, Pieter Hanekom. There's a question from Steven Detroia at AfriFocus Securities. For an outstanding set of results, do you see any potential opportunities to make acquisitions in the international space outside of South Africa? Given the trending decline in rand strength, your international operations provide a natural currency hedge. One challenge is that moving goods over long distances is slower and costlier than producing or packaging the products at the destination of consumption. Yeah. Thank you for that question. I think my comment on that would be if I look at the current percentage of our international business towards our total revenue, I think we're quite comfortable with that percentage at this stage. I'm not saying that we won't look at any opportunities if it arises, but I think it will have to be an extremely good opportunity for us where we would see some shareholder value added and earnings. It needs to be earnings accretive. I think it is not something that on our radar as we sit here today, obviously if there's an exciting opportunity, we will be interested to have a look at that. I don't think that will be our main focus, to necessarily have an investment in other parts of the world. Although it's not something that we will be, that we will not be looking at if it's a real exciting opportunity for us. Thanks, Pieter. There's a question from Topelo Maponyane from HSBC. Topelo says, "How should we think about the regional margin going forward? Yeah, I think, Topelo, thank you for that question. Obviously, that is a part of our business, as I've also made mention, where there's massive opportunity for us to increase that margin. I think a couple of comments in that regard. From mid-September to October, we have seen recovery in those margins. It was a difficult six months, the last six months, as you would have seen in our regional business, due to the multiple increases that we had to push through in the trade, which obviously is not a very easy thing to do in a constrained environment. I am quite optimistic that in the next six months we will see a better, a lot better performance in that part of our business. focusing extremely hard on that price volume margin management. I think also one thing that we also do need is a bit of cost relief. I foresee that inflation will plateau in 2023, and hopefully there will also be some areas where we might get some relief in cost. Specifically, we need some relief in tin plate costs because the canned goods in that specific segment was under pressure due to those huge increases that we experienced. Obviously also those. It's not only linked to tin plate cost increases, but it's an international commodity. All tin plate is imported. Obviously the weakness of the rand also has an impact on those specific costs. We had huge increases, north of 30% on, in those specific categories of in those specific costs that we had to recover from the market, which was extremely difficult. We have seen the increases come through, we hope to see a good recovery in the margins. Still a bit early days, what we've seen in the latter part of the financial year in September and from October onwards, we have seen a recovery in those margins. Obviously the ideal margin for us is to get closer again to that. Is to move towards that target of 10%. Yeah, we need a bit of cost relief, also and inflation to stabilize for us to be able to get closer to that margin. Pieter, there's a question from Charles Boles from Titanium Capital, he's asking: How viable is it to achieve a 10% international margin through the cycle? 2022 international has done well, but prior years were not so. Yeah. Just what margin is achievable? Yeah. I think there was a bit of a fundamental change that has happened. A couple of things that excites me in that business to say that is something that I think is achievable for us. I think number one, the failure of the Greek crop really gave us a lot of advantages. There was a couple of can-caners that also closed down in Greece, with a bit of less competition. We've also seen that the international markets in international business, specifically also in Europe, they've also had the same increases in can cost and also have huge increases in energy. What we've seen is that looking at the year to come, we're currently in busy negotiating prices for the new crop that starts in a week or two. We've actually sold a lot of our product already. I feel quite confident that we've got a bit of a transformed business from a market perspective that we had a couple of years ago. We must recall, we had a couple of headwinds in prior years. Number one, having an issue with the drought where we had quality issue on peaches, and then we had the lockdowns in the specific eastern markets, which are good profitable markets for us, where they locked down using our product in the bakery categories. We were then forced actually to open up other markets, we managed to open up other markets that are also, for us, profitable ones. I think we really from a fundamentally a lot better position from the international side than we have been, have been ever. I think we've got an exceptional sales team that sells our products. We're very much in the markets after having opened up. I think that's really important. We're visiting our customers frequently, we continue to do revenue management by selling to new customers in the business which opened up for us due to the Greek crop failure last year. We've also see the Spanish crop being under pressure this year due to some hail damage. There was, there's also opportunities for us, and we are taking those. I feel a lot more confident with regards to the international business to get that through the cycle, 10% operating profit that we've ever been. Pieter, the next question from Topelo again from HSBC, closely related to what you've just been speaking about. How sustainable is the international going into 2023? If you have any additional comments to add to what you've just said. Graham, I think maybe just one or two comments that I can add to that. I think I've covered a lot of the points, I really think that we obviously would love to get to that margin again. We're busy with putting our prices through in the market, Tiaan has not mentioned. Obviously of the older costs that we had last year, this year we will have also the higher costs from a can perspective in the first three to four months. Tiaan, I think we continue to ship some of the old products at the old cost, where we've got those shipments still to go. The new crop kicks in. We also work with agriculture, we're quite confident that we're gonna have a good crop from apricot and peach perspective. We're not worried that the volumes will not come in unless something really funny happens. We're quite confident in that regard. Yes, I think we've got a chance to be able to look at that driving that 10% operating margin again. It's a bit early days, as I said. The apricots only, we will start to can at the end of this week, start next week, and then beginning of January, we will can the peaches. We're quite confident that we will have a good performance again in the year to come. Thanks, Pieter. Another question from Charles at Titanium Capital. Why do you think the Today business performed poorly historically, and what changes have been made under RFG's management? Yeah. I think what we have done in the first seven months, which we knew that we had to do. Number one, obviously we knew we had to close down the facility in Atlantis. We had spare capacity at our plants up in Fouten. We knew as of day one, and that was an agreement we had with the Competition Commission, that that would most probably be the case, that we would close down the plant. So number one, we closed down the plant and moved the volumes up to our two Hartenk plants, where obviously we will get operational leverage. Tiaan made mention of the initial cost we had in the business. That was due to closing down the facility where we had to pay severance packages to the employees, and obviously had to move equipment, move stock around the country. We had a lot of additional costs, as was made mention. We also had to do some SKU rationalization, as I mentioned in my presentation. What also happened is it was a bit of a perfect storm when we took over the business. The price increases that had to recover cost push in the previous six-nine months didn't go through in the trade. When we took over the business, we were behind on price increases. We got the exorbitant cost increases that came through in the next three-four months. We had to go, I think, three times back to the trade to be able to recover cost. You can imagine if you take over a business on the first of February, as we all know from a Competition Commission perspective, you're not allowed to have any discussions on pricing up till the day that you start with the business. The first thing you do is to go to a retailer and tell them that you're gonna increase the prices. To be straight up, it was a difficult time for us, but I'm extremely happy to say that I think our execution of the takeover was really very good. We have managed to get the price increases. Margins have started to recover, and I'm quite confident that we will have a good result in the next financial year and also in the next six months. Another question from Charles from Titanium Capital. It says, "Was the international margin in 2022 inflated by a mismatch between the exchange rate of the buy-ins of raws and packaging material compared to the sellout exchange rate of finished goods? Yes. I won't call it a mismatch, but there was certainly a difference as is, I mentioned in the slide about international trade. We always guide that it's important that the exchange rate that prevails during the two halves of the financial year, because in the first half we manufacture all the products that we export thereafter. This year around it was the ideal situation which prevailed where while we were manufacturing the exchange rate was ZAR 15 odd. And during the second half when we exported and there was no manufacturing, so very little cost incurred during the second half, it was ZAR 16. Between ZAR 16 and ZAR 17 to the US dollar. That was the ideal situation. The prior year I think it was the opposite. Yeah, it is important what happens in the two halves. Yeah, we benefited from it in the current year. We obviously are aware we can't manage the currency, but we do what we can via through our internal edge to try and minimize the impact of foreign exchange fluctuations on the results of international specifically. Thanks, Tiaan. Pieter, there's a question from Nick Wilson from Media24 business, saying, "We listened with interest when you said you were expanding into health brands and plant-based foods. How big a push are you planning? Yeah. It's, it's from that perspective, it's specifically at this stage more towards our ready meals part of our business. Although it's not a at this stage a really big part of that business, it is something that we're seeing some good growth although of a low base. We work very closely with our customer in that regard and continue to expand in products in that regard. We really closely obviously monitor that, as I said, the base is still fairly low. Yeah, I think there is some good opportunity for us in the future in that part of the business. I think, one thing that is important to note, at this stage, due to the lower volumes, obviously, it's not a cheap product to manufacture. As I said, I think the base at this stage is quite low, but there is some good growth that we are seeing in that specific category, and we are monitoring it very closely. Another question from Tapela from HSBC. What kind of margin do you aim for in the Today pie business? I think obviously the margin that we're also aiming there is our operating profit of 10%. That must be our goal. If we don't get to that 10%, I think it's gonna be difficult for us to drive our group goal of 10%. That is the goal, to achieve a 10% operating profit margin. A question from Vikash Chana at RMB Morgan Stanley. What is the expectation for the upcoming festive season? Have the retailers bought more stock than last year for the Christmas trade or soft consumer macro conditions implying that Christmas season won't be so good? I think what we have seen, we've seen some good purchases from our customers in the latter part of September as well as into October, November. It is usually the case that the retailers will stock up to have their stock in by end November, beginning December. The million-dollar question is what's gonna happen in December usually. If you saw the results of and commentary of Shoprite Checkers in the last week, they might mention that they well-stocked in their business. Obviously, we work closely with our retailers with regards to stock. On the one hand, you don't want to be overstocked, and on the other hand, you don't wanna be understocked. It's a bit of a balance. I think it will be interesting to see what's gonna happen with all the Black Friday specials that's gonna break in the next week. Then it's all... Let's see what's gonna happen in December. As we sit here today, we positive about what will happen in December, that we'll get some good volumes going through. It's a bit early days for us to see it. From the retailer's perspective, they definitely are buying in stock. Looking forward to a good, a good December festive season. Let's see what happens with Black Friday. The stocks are being cleaned out, Black Friday deals and also what happens then. Let's look forward to a good December, but we're quite optimistic that it will be a good December. Let's see. Thanks, Pieter. There are no more questions coming in on the webcast. Thanks. Thank you very much for everybody for joining. We appreciate it.
Loading workspace