November 4 (SeeNews) - Danish agricultural investment company FirstFarms sold a 477 hectare (ha) land plot in western Romania for 20 million Danish crowns (3.1 million/2.7 million euro), it said on Thursday.
The sale is part of an agreement signed by FirstFarms in May 2020 to divest a total 1,675 ha it owns in western Romania, the company said in a press release.
You can download the 2023 Agriculture industry in Southeast Europe report here
You can subscribe to our M&A newsletter here
The total sales price for the 1,675 ha is expected to reach 85 million Danish crowns.
A total of 1,410 hectares have now been sold and the remaining 265 hectares are expected sold in the first quarter of 2022, the company added.
"The sale is proceeding according to plan, and we can now look forward to the fifth tranche, which will be the end of our operations in West Romania. Instead, we will shift our Romanian focus towards our large crop production in the eastern part of the country," FirstFfarms CEO Anders H. Nørgaard said.
The land plots were purchased in 2007-2008 and operated by First Farms in the last five years.
The company also said that it has focused on the development of the land portfolio, but the operating results have not been satisfactory.
As a significant part of the company's business model, the land's value has been increased following extensive trenching, swap and structure improvement. The properties in western Romania constitute 5% of the company's total turnover.
In July, FirstFrams announced it has signed a conditional sales agreement to sell its activities in northwest Romania for 104 million Danish crowns before the end of 2021.
FirstFarms is a Danish public limited company that purchases and modernises farming companies in order to optimize their operations in terms of competitiveness of the price and quality of their produce. Its activities are concentrated in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania and Hungary.
(1 Danish crown=0.1345 euro)