Cooke lands double hake deal
The Cooke family – owners of a number of fish farming operations in the Americas, Spain and the UK, including Cooke Aquaculture Scotland – has formally acquired the assets of Fripur SA, Uruguay’s largest seafood company.
The final closing took place yesterday (December 14), when a public purchase deed was signed in Uruguay, finalizing a thorough court approval process.
Cooke had previously begun to repair the Uruguayan fishing vessels and the company anticipates a resumption of fishing operations early in 2017. Fripur traditionally harvests approximately 16,000 tonnes of hake and 1,600 tonnes of red crab annually within its Uruguayan operations.
The acquisition of Grinfin, a subsidiary of Fripur based in Argentina, was completed several weeks ago and fishing has already started. That purchase was made through Wanchese Argentina, an entity owned by Cooke Seafood USA. Grinfin ?employs 70 people and the operation includes 3 large hake fishery vessels along with an office in Buenos Aires. Grinfin has a quota to fish 8,000 tonnes of hake per year in Argentina.
