Irish food ingredients multinational Kerry Group has a policy of producing locally that should protect against possible tariffs, its chief executive said today, but that it is too soon to gauge any impact this year's performance.
US President Donald Trump has said in recent days that he would impose reciprocal tariffs on every country that charges duties on US imports, increasing fears of a global trade war.
"Because of the local nature of our business, we're probably better positioned relative to many of our competitors," chief executive Edmond Scanlon told Reuters in an interview.
"There might be a few challenges. There might be a few opportunities as well."
Kerry Group, which operates a global network of food, beverage, biotechnology and pharmaceutical ingredient production, has long had a policy of producing products close to customers, using mainly local raw materials.
Its annual results showed that the majority of €6.9 billion in revenue was earned in the Americas in 2024.
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But Mr Scanlon said it was impossible to say with confidence if the company's financial forecasts might be thrown off by tariffs.
"We're purely in the speculation zone at the moment," he said.
Kerry said it expected adjusted earnings per share of 7-11% this year, compared to 9.7% in 2024 on a constant currency basis.
Asked about food regulation under the Trump administration, the CEO said Kerry would be well positioned to help food producers roll out healthier offerings, with technologies to reduce salt, sugar and fat.
"The overall philosophy seems to be, you know, Make America Healthy Again. And I feel we're very well positioned to help customers to make packaged food healthier," he said.
Kerry has not seen any evidence of customers stocking up ahead of possible tariffs, Mr Scanlon added.
He also said that a change in its listing on the Irish Stock Exchange is not on the company's agenda.
The food technology and ingredients company said today that its profit after tax for the year came to €673m, down from €728m in 2023, while it has declared a final dividend of 89 cent per share.
Its total dividend for 2024 was up 10.1% to 127.1 cent.
Kerry said that while a number of its markets remained subdued, 2024 represented a more "normalised" year relative to recent history.
"Customer innovation activity was more weighted towards renovation of existing products, with an increased focus on nutritional profile enhancement and cost optimisation," it said.
"A significant level of new product innovation concentrated on addressing increased consumer demand for new taste experiences and providing relative value options," it added.
Kerry said that revenues at its Taste & Nutrition division rose by 3.4% to €6.929 billion, while EBITDA was up 5.9% to €1.256 billion with continued progression during the year.
It noted that foodservice performed strongly with volume growth of 6.8%, supported by new menu innovations, seasonal products and solutions designed to reduce operational costs and simplify processes, while growth in the retail channel of 1.8% reflected good performances in the Americas and APMEA.
"The year's growth was led by innovations incorporating Kerry's broad range of taste and proactive health technologies. Proactive health also delivered excellent growth, most notably in technologies for digestive, cognitive and women's health," it added.
Business volumes in emerging markets increased by 6.5%, with good growth across the Middle East, Africa, LATAM and Southeast Asia.
Meanwhile, revenue at its Dairy Ireland division was up 1.6% to €1.315 billion, with EBITDA up 17.6% to €63m on the back of Dairy Consumer Products' growth and mix development, combined with a
recovery in Dairy Ingredients.
As previously announced, the transaction for the initial disposal of 70% of Kerry Dairy Ireland by Kerry Group to Kerry Co-Operative Creameries Limited completed at the end of the year.
Edmond Scanlon said Kerry's strong performance across the year reflected continued volume progression in Taste & Nutrition and strong margin expansion across the business.
"We continued to strategically evolve our portfolio, including further developing our Biotechnology Solutions capability and the significant divestment of Kerry Dairy Ireland, which resulted in Kerry becoming a pure-play taste and nutrition company," he said.
"As we look to 2025, Kerry remains strongly positioned for good market outperformance due to our unique positioning with our customers as an innovation and renovation partner," the CEO said.
"We expect to deliver good volume growth and strong margin expansion, resulting in constant currency adjusted earnings per share growth of 7% to 11%, after the dilution from the Kerry Dairy Ireland disposal," he added.
Kerry has multiple manufacturing and supply operations globally, including in the US, however Mr Scanlon said they will wait and see what new policies or tariffs are implemented by the Trump administration.
"Our strategy and our philosophy is very much to operate a local production environment or to be in a local production environment, and our strategy is to source and develop manufacture in the countries in which we operate and that's largely the same in the US," said Mr Scanlon said on RTÉ's Morning Ireland .
"We have to see how things play out but based on that strategy, we do feel we're somewhat insulated from tariffs to a large degree, but ultimately we're just going to have to see how things play out," he added.
Shares in Kerry ended lower in Dublin trade today.
Additional reporting by Glenda Sheridan
