| 2000/07 Fertiliser Firm Spreads Across the Country |
 |
 |
 |
| Latest News | ||
|
By MICHAEL POLLITT, Agricultural Editor, Eastern Daily Press Saturday 15th July 2000 One of the country's leading independent fertiliser companies is set for further expansion from its headquarters on the Norfolk coast. J & H Bunn, which was founded almost 200 years ago in Yarmouth, has grown rapidly in the past six years. It now has 12 per cent of the national fertiliser market. The firm employs 110 staff at plants in England and Scotland. While many multi-national competitors have withdrawn from the market, J & H Bunn has expanded and accounts for around 600,000 tonnes of the fertiliser market or one in every eight tonnes spread across the country. Stalham Farmers' Club, which is the second oldest in the country and was established in 1841, toured the company's Yarmouth base. The 42-strong party was told that J & H Bunn is opening a satellite plant at Sharpness, near Stroud in Gloucestershire, to serve the market in the Cotswolds. As part of the rapid expansion plan, J & H Bunn, which was founded in 1816,has now become a national fertiliser company, said David Harrod, who was appointed joint managing director in May. The company employs almost 60 staff at Bunns Lane, Yarmouth, and also at a bagging and blending plant at Gorleston. It recently bought the nine-acre site of the former Birds Eye cold store at Yarmouth's South Denes. This will give the company seven acres of covered storage, loading and handling facilities. The planned refurbishment, which includes an 8000 sq metre building plus two slightly smaller stores, should be ready within 12 months. This will allow the next stage of expansion. There are plans to remove the bagging and blending plant from Gorleston because the local council, which is also the landlord, wants to develop a five-acre site into a high-tech park. Bunns, which has been transformed from a traditional agricultural and grain merchants since the mid 1960s, now has a reputation as a fertiliser specialist serving the whole of England and the arable eastern half of Scotland. It has a plant at Montrose, which was established about 25 years ago, serving the wholesale fertiliser trade. The Yorkshire and north Lincolnshire market is serviced out of Humberside. Mr Harrod said that 18 months ago, it was decided to invest in a 200,000 tonne annual capacity plant at Billingham, Cleveland, which is next to the the giant ICI chemical complex. "We see opportunities for us to grow in this area," he said. Another long-established plant at Falmouth with 80,000 tonnes annual capacity, has been operating successfully for 30 years. The venture at Sharpness is set to come into production next month with projected tonnage of some 100,000 tonnes a year. Matthew Tooley, who is responsible for shipping and production, said that the plant will replace some of the 30,000 tonnes transported by road. J & H Bunn, which started blending fertilisers in the 1970s, is a big importer of ammonium nitrate and straight products from Europe and north Africa. It takes 15 hours for two cranes to unload a 3000-tonne freighter and between four and five vessels arrive each week. Mr Tooley said that the Yarmouth port could not handle vessels of more than 3000 tonnes because of the shallow river and width of the navigation channel. The construction of the proposed £30 million outer harbour would transform the port's capacity and would enabled vessels of between 8000 and 9000 tonnes to visit. Mr Tooley said that the latest load of prilled ammonium nitrate (34.5 per cent) from the Ukraine will be blended for despatch to the company's army of customers. The fertiliser market has undergone great change in the past year with the loss of some four million tonnes of production from Europe. Mr Tooley said that fertiliser is set to become increasingly short as production is removed from the European market.
|
||
UK Farming News
| FWi - All News |
|
