Puchi: "The acquisition just made by Cermaq is good news for the industry"
The businessman said that the acquisition of the Chilean salmon firm Cultivos Marinos Chiloé (CM Chiloé) at the hands of the Cermaq is welcomed. "It is good news for the Chilean industry and we see it with admiration," he said. He added that this is a great achievement, but said that when it comes to AquaChile, he prefers unions or mergers between producing companies, rather than a consolidation through acquisitions.
"After 25 years in operation in this industry, no company is dispensable. We must partner between different producers in order to make more robust companies from the sanitary point of view which can better address the different markets," he said.
Empresas AquaChile remained in the first place among the largest salmon producing companies in our country for 16 months in a row, until the purchase of CM Chiloé positioned Cermaq in the first place. Regarding the possibility of taking actions that could allow them to regain that position, Victor Hugo Puchi said that his company is not in a race for being the production leader. "We are interested in doing things right and if we can help by partnering with other companies, we will do it when this is appropriate and when the opportunity appears," he added.
New regulations As for the new regulations developed for the sector, the president of Empresas AquaChile said that the principle achieved by the Authority is the most valuable accomplishment, since it meant abandoning the previous model where productivity growth was the main driver. Instead, he said, there is now awareness about sanitary sustainability as the most determining criteria. "The government will regulate us so that we can prevent and anticipate crises. In addition, if it is necessary to produce less, we will have to do it and if we need to relocate farming sites to other areas for sanitary reasons, we will do it too. This process is a substantial improvement in the production conditions, which reduce the sanitary risk of the industry and we see it as a positive change," he said.
Finally, he said that there is no possibility of a crisis in the short-term, such as that experienced with the ISA virus a few years ago, "because at the onset of an outbreak, the state is now prepared to contain the spread of any disease", he concluded.
