Inghams Group Limited (ING) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Well, good morning, everyone, and welcome on this really wet and drewy day, so roll on for braving the weather. My name is Helen Nash, the Chair of Inghams Group Limited. On behalf of the Board and the management team and all our staff, I'd like to welcome all shareholders and guests to the 2024 Annual General Meeting. It's now 10:00, and there being a quorum present, I declare the 2024 Annual General Meeting of Inghams Group Limited opened. First of all, on behalf of Inghams, I would like to acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation on whose land we meet today. I pay my respects to their elders, past and present and to any Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people joining us here today. The agenda for today's meeting will be as follows: I will give my Chair's address. Your Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Andrew Reeves, will then give his address, and I will then move to the formal items of business and resolution as set out in our Notice of Meeting. Once concluded, we will open the meeting to general business and questions. This year's meeting is being held as a hybrid meeting and a guide to the online meeting platform has been made available on the Investor Center on our website. Voting today will be conducted by way of a poll on all items of business. For our shareholders attending virtually and eligible to vote once voting opens, select the vote icon and all resolutions will be activated with voting options. To cast your vote, simply select one of the options and your vote will be automatically recorded. You have the ability to amend your vote up until the time I declare voting closed. For those attending the meeting in person and eligible to vote, you should have received a blue voting card at registration. If you believe you're entitled to vote and have not received the correct voting card, please see Computershare staff at the registration table at the back of the room. To cast your vote, simply complete and sign the back of the card. A Computershare representative will collect your voting card at the end of the meeting. I will provide a notification at the end of all items of business before I move to close voting. If we experience technical difficulties in broadcasting the AGM to shareholders, we will pause the meeting and aim to recommence at the earliest opportunity. If these difficulties persist, I will assess the circumstances and then communicate further with you. If we need to take steps to adjourn the meeting, we'll make an announcement to the ASX with all the relevant details. Computershare is the returning officer for this meeting. The final results will be released to the market and Ingham's website later today. I now declare voting open. How to ask a question. For our shareholders attending in person, those in possession of either a blue voting card or yellow nonvoting card are welcome to ask questions, while those with a white visitor card are not able to ask questions during the meeting. We've placed 3 microphones here, here, and here towards the front of the room. If you have a question for the relevant item of business, please proceed towards one of the microphones. I will indicate when we're ready to take your question at which time, please introduce yourself and ask a question. If you believe you have not received the correct card, please go to the registration desk at the back of the room where Computershare representatives will help you. Virtual attendees can submit questions at any time. [Operator Instructions]. I will address questions during the discussion about relevant items of business. Please note that your questions may be moderated or if we receive multiple questions on the same topic, similar may be amalgamated. For those shareholders who wish to ask a verbal question via the telephone line, please follow the instructions below the broadcast. We will make every attempt to answer all your questions. I would like to thank shareholders who submitted questions in advance of today's AGM. These questions have been incorporated into my speech, and I will address them at the appropriate time during the meeting. If time constraints prevent us from answering all questions, unanswered questions will be posted to the Investor Center on the Inghams website at the end of the meeting. I would like to introduce you to the other Board members here today. Start with Reeves, Non-Executive Director, Linda Bardo-Nicholls AO, who is standing for reelection today, and you'll hear from Linda later; Non-Executive Director, Rob Gordon; Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Risk and Sustainability Committee, Margie Haseltine; Non-Executive Director and Chair of the Finance and Audit Committee, Mike Ihlein; and Non-Executive Director and Chair of the People and Remuneration Committee, Tim Longstaff. I would like to thank the Board for their unwavering commitment, their outstanding intellect and diligence throughout the year. I feel very privileged to work with this group of people and to be their Chair. Now the leadership team is also here seated in the front row, so welcome to them. And also joining us today, representing our external auditor is KPMG, Trent Duvall. Trent will be available during the formal items of business to respond to questions relevant to the conduct of the audit and the preparation and content of the independent auditor's report. So turning now to my presentation. I am pleased to report that Inghams delivered record underlying financial results in 2024. Our key earnings, profit and cash flow metrics showed strong year-on-year growth with these results underpinned by growth in both volumes and margins, a solid operating performance across farming and production and strong cost control. Our commitment to the execution of our strategy and delivery of key initiatives are important foundations to our performance. FY '24 represented a busy period of investment for the company. These investments included the acquisition of the previously leased primary processing plant in Bolivar, South Australia and the acquisition of the Bromley Park Hatcheries business in New Zealand. We also acquired New Zealand's only organic chicken business, Bostock Brothers, positioning us to grow this niche high-value product in export markets and with new customers. Andrew will cover our investment activities in more detail shortly. I would, however, like to take the opportunity to acknowledge all of our people and to thank them on behalf of all stakeholders for their strong work ethic and focus on delivering great value to our customers. And I would particularly like to acknowledge and congratulate Andrew and his leadership team on delivering record results for Inghams. Safety is integral to the way that we operate and the safety of our teams, contractors and visitors is paramount to our success. This year, we completed our 2022 to 2024 Safety for Life program, and work has recently been completed on the development of the NEXT program. The total recordable injury frequency rate declined by 7% in FY '24, contributing to a total improvement in this important safety measure of 56% over the last 5 years. Our work health and safety management system is helping to identify and control hazards, conduct effective risk management and manage chain of responsibility for injury prevention and health preservation. In May 2024, we launched our Reflect Reconciliation Action plan. This important initiative aims to support greater opportunities for First Nations people to thrive in our business and our community. The launch took place at our new South Australian distribution center, which is significant as the facility exemplifies our commitment to sustainability and community. As part of the launch of our RAP, Inghams commissioned an artwork by local aboriginal artist, Kelly Taylor, which appeared earlier in this presentation. Achieving our objective to deliver consistent and reliable returns to our stakeholders will only be possible where sustainability and climate change risks have been identified and mitigated. Our sustainability road map guides the integration of sustainability into how we think, act and measure success in driving sustainable change. With a sustainability strategy that is focused on the most material factors to our business, we aim to make a positive difference by embedding sustainability best practice into everything we do. We have made great progress over the last year across a range of sustainability initiatives. Our waste to landfill intensity has declined by 30% since FY '20, resulting in the achievement of our FY '30 target 6 years ahead of schedule. Our strong food safety focus has been recognized with the achievement of A or AA Global Food Safety Initiative, British Retail Consortium ratings across all of our sites. We also launched our first sustainability-linked loan, which links the interest rates on our debt to greenhouse gas, water and waste targets. For those who are interested in reading more about our initiatives and results, I'm sure you'll find our updated sustainability report, which is in our annual report to be a valuable resource. We were very pleased to welcome Margie Haseltine to the Board in September 2003. Margie was subsequently elected to the Board at last year's AGM, is now Chair of our Risk and Sustainability Committee and a member of the Nomination Committee. At this year's AGM, pursuant to the ASX listing rules and the company's constitution, Linda Bardo-Nicholls AO is standing for reelection. You will have the opportunity to hear from Linda a little later when we move to her resolution. Turning to a review of remuneration, starting with the FY '24 outcomes. Looking first at the short-term incentive plan or what we call STIP. STIP payments are conditional on the achievement of performance objectives against a key financial measure, 3 nonfinancial ESG measures and the individual's overall performance in contributing to the achievement of our group strategic objectives. In FY '24 and moving forward, we're using underlying pre-AASB 16 EBITDA as the sole financial performance measure, which is consistent with the measure used in FY '22 and prior years. The weighting of this measure has been increased and is now 70% of the STIP scorecard. Based on overall company performance during the financial year, the STIP balance scorecard outcome was 96 out of a possible 120. As a result, the individual final STIP outcome for the executive KMP was 64% of the maximum outcome for both the CEO and Managing Director and the CFO. The balance equating to 36% for each participant was forfeited in line with our remuneration framework and policies. For the long-term incentive plan, or LTIP, there was a 33.29% vesting under the FY '22 to '24 plan. The performance achieved against the relative total shareholder return measure, which represents half of the LTIP scorecard was at the 58th percentile, resulting in 66.58% of the TSR-based rights vesting. The return on invested capital measure, which represents the other 50% of the LTIP scorecard was below the minimum level and as a result, no rights vested for this component. In respect of Board fees, the fee structure has remained largely unchanged since IPO in 2016, except for 2020 when committee fees were introduced. As you will have read in our annual report, a benchmarking process was undertaken this year in FY '24 to assess Board fees. As a result of this process, it was determined that there should be an increase to nonexecutive director Board fees and relevant committee fees. There was no increase to the Chair's Board fee. The details of the nonexecutive director remuneration are outlined on Page 20 of the 2024 annual report. Turning to this year's FY '25 base remuneration. Total fixed remuneration or TFR is reviewed annually with each review taking into consideration a variety of key factors, including, but not limited to the responsibilities and experience in the role, business impact, recognition of desired behaviors and comparable market rates. As a result of the detailed FY '24 benchmarking process, the Board determined that there would be an increase of 4.2% to the total fixed remuneration for the CEO and Managing Director. For the CFO, there was a small adjustment relating to the minimum superannuation guarantee contributions. Ingham's remuneration strategy and structure is designed to support our purpose, ambition, values and behaviors with incentives to create value for our shareholders, customers and the community over the short, medium and long term. The structure includes an equity component to foster a business ownership approach. For the FY '25 short-term incentive plan, it is proposed to retain the current 70-30 mix between financial and nonfinancial measures, where the nonfinancial measures emphasize the importance of ESG to our business. The ESG factors are subject to safety and animal welfare modifiers, which means that if there were to be a significant people, food safety or animal welfare incident, the 30% ESG component could be reduced to as low as 0. For FY '25, continuing our focus on our high standards in food safety, we are refining the food safety test to incorporate the world's best practice BRC food audit ratings across our sites. Consistent with prior years, the FY '25 to '27 LTIP is based on the satisfaction of 2 equally weighted performance measures underlying pre-AASB 16 return on invested capital and relative total shareholder return. The calculation of the relative TSR component is unchanged. It is our belief that relative TSR, which is measured over a 3-year period, incentivizes management to focus on long-term strategies and sustainable growth rather than short-term gains. The linking of an element of long-term executive compensation outcomes with shareholder returns is, as we believe, effective in aligning executive compensation outcomes with the returns that shareholders experience and receive. In respect of the return on invested capital component, there are 2 elements I would like to bring to your attention that have informed the ROIC target that has been adopted for the FY '25 to '27 LTIP. First, we have refined the definition of net operating profit after tax, or NOPAT, which is used in the calculation of ROIC. The second is the effect of the purchase of the Bolivar primary processing facility in November 2023. Looking first at the calculation of NOPAT. Many of you will be familiar with our inventory trade payable facility, which is used exclusively for all feed purchases by the business in both Australia and New Zealand. Following stakeholder feedback received earlier this year, a subsequent review of our methodology and noting that this facility is not classified as debt under the accounting standards, commencing in FY '25, the interest cost relating to this facility will be excluded from the interest cost adjustment that forms part of the NOPAT calculation. As a guide, if this adjustment was applied to the FY '24 ROIC calculation, it would have reduced the FY '24 ROIC by approximately 80 basis points. Secondly, we had regard to the purchase of the Bolivar primary processing plant, which had previously operated under a long-term lease arrangement. The Board and management consider there to be a significant strategic benefit in owning our key production sites, and we believe the acquisition of Bolivar will be value accretive over the medium to long term. In the short term, however, it is ROIC negative, and it increases the invested capital of the company by a greater relative proportion than the increase in NOPAT. This had the effect of reducing the FY '24 ROIC by 110 basis points. In terms of the overall ROIC target, while the target that has been set by the Board for the FY '25 to '27 LTIP is on an absolute basis, lower than the target adopted for the FY '24 to '26 LTIP, the differential is primarily explained by the impact of the 2 elements that I have just outlined. Importantly, the overall remuneration outcome remains unchanged, which means there is no net benefit or detriment to participants in the FY '25 to '27 LTIP from these changes. I also note that the Board has set hurdles with a greater emphasis on the stretch outcomes. At our FY '24 results announcement, we discussed the new supply agreement with Woolies which Andrew will comment on in his presentation shortly. From a remuneration perspective, the Board has actively considered the new agreement in setting the remuneration to ensure that these remuneration arrangements align with the shareholder experience. In the FY '24 STIP outcome recognized the record pre-AASB 16 EBITDA result and the strong business and operational performance. At the same time, the Woolworths agreement variation informed the capping of the executive KMP individual multiplier at 1x despite individual and business performance results supporting a higher outcome. In FY '25, the Board is striving to strike an appropriate balance between encouraging attainable outcomes and reflecting the shareholder experience. To that end, the Board has set STIP and LTIP targets with a bias to stretch performance. The Board remains committed to ensuring the remuneration strategy reflects good governance and is transparent in its design to support the business strategy and drive sustainable outperformance for shareholders over the short, medium and long term. For those who wish to read more, the remuneration report starts on Page 72 of the 2024 annual report. Looking ahead, the poultry sector remains an attractive and growing one, underpinned by several significant advantages, including a price advantage and well-established health benefits over red meat and a meaningful sustainability advantage with a carbon footprint that is 5x smaller than red meat. We have a highly experienced leaders and a capable and committed passionate team of around 8,000 people striving to deliver our customers with the highest quality products and services. I will now hand over to your Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, Andrew Reeves, to take you through more of the detail that underpins our business and performance. Thank you, Andrew.

Thanks, Helen, and good morning to everyone. It's my pleasure to be presenting at today's Annual General Meeting, and I'd like to add my welcome to all of those joining us today. Inghams is the largest poultry producer across Australia and New Zealand, and our diverse national network provides us with important advantages as a key poultry provider. Our operations are vertically integrated and by effectively controlling all elements of the production process, we can realize efficiencies across all aspects of our supply chain. As a result, we can ensure that we achieve the appropriate production balance in our operations, which combined with operational excellence are important to growing returns over time. Our ambition is to be our customers and consumers' first choice for poultry across Australia and New Zealand. Our strategy is focused on growth and value creation by leveraging consumer insights and established trends to improve the value of our product mix over time, underpinned by sustaining and growing strong supply partnerships with customers and together, growing the value of the category. As a business, we aim to maintain a diversified and balanced portfolio across all major channels and market segments with a focus on continuously improving and enhancing operations to improve capability and efficiency. So turning now to our financial performance in FY '24. As Helen noted earlier, Inghams delivered a record set of financial results for FY '24. Group core poultry volume increased by 2.8% over FY '23, with New Zealand volume growth particularly strong at 8.4% as operations returned to a normal cadence, while Australia grew at 1.9%. Across our channels, the key themes were broadly consistent in Australia and New Zealand with stronger retail growth in both markets as consumers responded to cost of living pressures by shifting consumption towards in-home dining options. This shift was at the expense of the traditional out-of-home channels, including quick service restaurants and foodservice customers. Total revenue grew strongly at 7.2%, reflecting a combination of volume and price growth. We saw core poultry price growth across our 3 key channel groupings, resulting in overall price growth of 5.4% on the prior comparative period. The general rate of inflation across the economy has moderated a little. However, costs are still rising and therefore, remain elevated. Underlying pre-AASB 16 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization increased 30.8% to $240.1 million, and our net profit after tax grew 68% to $101.5 million. Australia and New Zealand both made strong contributions to the earnings and profit results with the New Zealand business notably delivering underlying pre-AASB 16 EBITDA growth of 100.9%. The strength of our financial performance underpinned total dividends declared or paid in respect of FY '24 of $0.20 per share, which is a significant increase of 38% on the prior corresponding period and as a result, our payout ratio, which is consistent with our policy of 73.1%. Toward the end of FY '24, we agreed the in-principle commercial terms for renewal of our multiyear supply agreement with Woolworths. Importantly, Inghams will remain Woolworths' #1 poultry supply partner. The key provisions of the new agreement will take effect progressively in the second and third quarter of this financial year. The reduction in volume under the new agreement enables us to accelerate the execution of our customer diversification strategy and aligns with Woolworths' approach of diversifying its supplier mix across the fresh poultry category. We have already won significant new business with other supermarket customers in FY '25, and we are actively working on additional new business opportunities. Overall, we view this transition to be a manageable one with the effect of the new agreement and the new business factored into our FY '25 guidance and outlook. On March 7, we announced the acquisition of Bostock Brothers Organic Chicken business in New Zealand for NZD 35.3 million. The acquisition of Bostock Brothers aligns with Ingham's strategy and provides growth opportunities, which include greater New Zealand domestic market share, export and expansion into value-added and further processed categories. I am pleased to report having received the required approvals, we settled on the acquisition of the business and the farms on July 1, 2024, which was ahead of forecast. And overall, the integration is well on track. FY '24 was a busy period for investment from an investment standpoint, with total capital expenditure and acquisitions of $168.3 million. $36.6 million of which was focused on core and high-growth projects. The focus of our investment is on the future, particularly our network capacity and capability. We completed 2 strategic investments with the acquisition of the Bolivar primary processing plant in South Australia and the acquisition of Bromley Park Hatcheries business in New Zealand. The acquisition of Bromley Park Hatcheries represents a compelling opportunity to apply Ingham's knowledge and best practice approach to generate improved performance. We are very well progressed in implementing new automation investments, which will future-proof the business through improved efficiency and capability to meet current and future consumer requirements, ensuring we are strongly positioned for long-term sustainable growth. The installation of 4 new leg deboning machines was completed toward the end of the first half of FY '24, earlier than forecast and ahead of budget. And the installation of the new waterjet cutters is due for completion early in FY '25. The development of our new distribution center in Hazelmere, Western Australia was also completed and the facility is now operational. In August, we outlined 2 projects that, while comparatively small in the amount of capital they require us to invest are expected to generate significant benefits for the business over time. The first of these is an investment we are making at Lizero to convert our production line to a fully cooked capability. This will add a second fully cooked manufacturing site to our network, providing East Coast capability and capacity and dual site contingency, which is something that's very important to our quick service restaurant customers. The second project will see us move our value enhanced production from our primary production facilities to Ingleburn in New South Wales as a further processing facility. The project will be completed in 2 stages during this financial year and is key to enabling the implementation of higher returning projects across our primary processing network. So moving now to an update on trading. I would like to finish my presentation this morning with an update on the current trading over the first 18 weeks of FY '25. Today, we are reaffirming guidance we gave at the FY '25 -- sorry, for FY '25 at our full year results briefing in August, which for underlying EBITDA pre-AASB 16 of $236 million to $250 million and for core poultry volumes to decline in the range of 1% to 3% versus the normalized result for FY '24, which largely reflects the effect of the new Woolworths agreement. I'm very pleased to report that we have covered 100% of the first tranche of the Woolworths volume reduction, which took effect in September of this year. The new business we have secured has come through growth with our other major supermarket customers. Of course, we remain focused on winning additional new business to cover the second and final tranche of the Woolworths volume reduction, which will take place in February of next year. Group core poultry net selling prices for the 2025 financial year-to-date are unchanged versus FY '24 at $6.28. This is a great outcome and reflects the disciplined approach we are taking to pricing as we win new business. Our core poultry volume performance is consistent with the guidance we have given for FY '25. And as expected, average weekly volumes have declined versus what was a stronger first half in FY '24. Pleasingly, I can report that despite the cost of living pressures we are seeing in the market, we have seen a return to growth in average weekly volumes versus the second half of FY '24. As we look forward to the remainder of FY '25, as you'll note from the chart on the right, while the second half FY '25 will reflect the full effect of the Woolworths volume reduction, second half volumes are expected to be flat versus the second half of '24, providing a very solid platform for future volume growth. As many of you know, feed is one of our most significant business costs. We are seeing some benefit of lower feed prices with future improvement anticipated as we progress through the financial year. Turning to look at volume and price in a little more detail. In terms of our volume performance, the key factor that has been affecting volumes has been consumer conditions and cost of living pressures. This has been most clearly seen in the reduction in performance of the out-of-home channels. That said, in early FY '24, QSR volumes have shown some signs of stabilizing in both Australia and New Zealand. Prices have remained overall stable versus FY '24 levels with modest growth in retail and foodservice, offset by lower pricing in wholesale. While Australia has seen modest overall price growth of 0.9%, wholesale pricing has declined approximately 7%. In New Zealand, overall selling prices have declined 2.8% due to a change in product mix in response to cost of living pressures. Overall, our operations are performing very well. The business is doing a good job of navigating current market conditions. We are making solid progress on diversifying our customer base following the reduction of the volume in Woolworths and prices have remained stable. In closing, we believe that Inghams represents a compelling proposition. We have deep relationships with our customers who prioritize poultry. We operate at scale, which translates to efficiency in a large and growing market, executing against relevant consumer insights. This provides a platform for delivering robust and attractive earnings over the longer term. We are leaders in safety, quality, welfare and sustainability. And we have the right capabilities and experience to execute our strategic plan, underpinned by the financial strength and flexibility that enables us to invest for growth. Thank you again for joining us today, and I'll now hand back to Helen to conduct the formal business of the meeting.

Thank you, Andrew. I'll now move to the formal items of business. The Notice of Meeting was lodged with the ASX on the 9 of October and is available on the Inghams website in the Investor Center. I propose that the notice of meeting be taken as read. Each resolution set out in the Notice of Meeting is to be considered as an ordinary resolution and to be approved by a simple majority of votes cast by shareholders entitled to vote. For all items of business and in accordance with any voting exclusions that apply to each resolution, undirected proxies that have been given to me as Chair or my fellow directors will be voted in favor of these items. The results of today's meeting will be released to the ASX and published on the Inghams Group Limited website later today. So the first item is the financial report. And we need to receive and consider the financial report of the company and its controlled entities and the reports of the directors and the auditor for the year-ended the 29 of June 2024. The annual financial report, directors' report and auditor's report are contained in the company's 2024 annual report, which was released to the market on the 9 of October. As I noted earlier, KPMG partner, Trent Duvall, is with us here today and available to respond to questions relevant to the conduct of the audit and the preparation and content of the independent auditor's report and independence declaration. This item of business is for discussion only, the Corporations Act directing that there is no vote required. I'll now take questions on this item of business, starting with questions in the room. Would anyone like to ask a question?

One please.

Yes, sure.

I'm Charles Kingston from K Capital. Just a question. Is that better?

Yes, that's better.

Sorry, [indiscernible], but anyway, I don't need to know about that, but I didn't realize the mic wasn't on. But just a question, I'm Charlie Kingston from K Capital. But read that slide that you showed for the investment proposition for Inghams. I appreciate that it's been a volatile time, and it's a very tough sector and anything in the ag market is clearly cyclical. But if we look at the long-term track record of Inghams when we floated, I think it was about 8 years ago in 2016, the float price was $3.15. Today, we're trading at about $3. Now TPG was the seller. Private equity, they sold a portion of their stock in the float, and then sold some at $3.60, $3.50, $3.30, et cetera. So certainly a great trade by them. But again, here we are today, still below that of the IPO price back in 2016. And again, I appreciate that there's been a lot of management turnover. I think the CEO has been here for 3 years or thereabouts. There's been lots of new Board members. But if we look at our dividends, which I suppose is the best reflection of what can be returned to shareholders, they are broadly flat, if not below the 2018 peak and they were above, I think, about $0.21 in that year. And of course, again, our share price is still below the IPO price. But it does just seem striking that we are an oligopoly. We're the biggest or the second biggest chicken company or poultry company in Australia. So I would have thought as an investment proposition, we should be able to deliver more of the sustainable long-term capital growth. And also a concern is our CapEx seems to be going up every year. We're also buying back assets that I believe we once sold short TPG. But definitely sold a lot of the tangible assets and now sold and leaseback and now we have to buy them back, it seems. So I'm not sure when that is going to end, but it does seem like we're in a much more vulnerable position today given we don't really have any land, don't have any tangible assets, and we now have to buy them back because of those increasing leasehold liabilities. So I suppose the simple question with that context is relative -- in response to that investment proposition, is Inghams just a range trade at best, noting certainly have been up to, I think, $4.50 or thereabouts, and now we're back at $3, but it does seem like, I suppose, with any ag company buy when the conditions are tough, sell when it's high. Is that a fair representation of Inghams as an investment proposition, noting it does seem to be fair since IPO? Or is the Board and management confident that you can actually deliver long-term sort of tangible growth or shareholder value, noting maybe that we've got a little bit of land back now that we're rebuying, but it does seem like it's just maybe a range trade at best. So any comments on that would be appreciated.

Thanks, Charlie. That's a very detailed question, a lot in there. So I might give you a couple of comments, and then I'll ask Andrew to comment as well. I think the first is to acknowledge where the share price is today, and it's a share price that I think we would all like to see higher. And it doesn't reflect certainly the confidence that I as Chair and the Board have in this business for the medium to long term. We believe that the 5-year plan for this business has lots of opportunity ahead of us. And I think it is worth acknowledging as well that we have lived through quite challenging times. Many companies have lived through very challenging times in recent years notwithstanding COVID being a black swan event that affected our business and many businesses in the country greatly. But we've seen strong recovery, and we do have very detailed and exciting plans for capital. I just wanted to pick up on your comment about buying back assets. We're going to buy very sensibly and strategically. Bolivar is the primary processing plant you referred to that we bought back. It does make sense for us to own some, not all, some of our very important strategic assets. And if we have the opportunity and can buy them back well, and we think that, that was a very smart decision given that we now control how we can deploy investment into Bolivar over the medium to long term, whereas we couldn't necessarily do that with a lease that might be way less time to expiry than a capital investment that we might make. So that's just a couple of comments from me, but I will ask Andrew to share some thoughts on his view on the medium to long term on the business as well.

Yes. Thanks, Helen. I think you've covered a lot of the really relevant points. I think the other thing I'd look at is the margin and earnings per kilogram, which is something that we focus on very strongly. And if you look at the trend over the last number of years, that's improving. We have an aspiration to continue for that to improve and our future plans have that. I think there's been an overreaction this year to the change in the Woolworths relationship. And hopefully, today, we can reassure the market that we're managing that transition well, and we've got a solid platform for long-term growth. So I think that focus on value and that focus on improving mix and margin is a really important one for this management team. And again, I think that should give you confidence that we can navigate these choppy waters at the moment, but we can, in fact, get back to good sustainable long-term earnings growth.

And just the second question, I think a key part of that is your EBITDA margin targets. I think it's 10%, please correct me.

That's our aspiration.

Aspiration, but I don't think that's ever been achieved since IPO nor if you look at the prospectus since 2014 or however far back that goes. And I'm sure, Andrew, you're going to be the exception that does achieve it, but it does seem like maybe it is a little bit unrealistic noting that the Woolworths contract, we're now losing volume from our biggest customer. So maybe if you could just touch please more as to why you are confident that, that aspiration can be achieved because again, we've lost volume from our biggest customer and they're clearly wanting to hold margin. And I'm not sure how much pricing power we have in that sense. I know chicken prices have gone up recently, but there was a very stagnant period for a very long time with costs seem to be going up. So maybe if you could just provide some color.

Sure. I mean that's -- I wouldn't just brush over the fact that chicken pricing has gone up after decades of being flat. That's a very important change in the market dynamic. There's 4 things we focus on that we believe will drive that improved margin, and we've got a track record in all of them. We have an extensive continuous improvement program that's well entrenched in the business and delivers considerable benefits every year, which allows us to manage our cost base. We've made significant capital investments in the last couple of years in automation, which are going extremely well. I noticed in my comments today that we've installed those projects ahead of -- on time and at of budget, and they're delivering extremely well for us. And there's more automation opportunities in the future for the business. So that's another way of enhancing margin. We're very focused with our customers on driving profitable mix, particularly driving volume into higher-margin, higher-growth categories. A great example of that is free range. And with Woolworths last year, for example, we expanded the amount of space that's allocated to free range product in their stores. And again, that's contributing to margin. And we do have some pricing power. We have shown price stability this year despite this loss of volume. I think the last couple of years have shown that we can recover costs through price. So if we keep focusing on those 4 things and do those and execute those well, then I think there's every chance that we can see that margin aspiration of 10% plus be achieved. And if you look at the trend over the last number of halves, we're on our way to achieving that.

Are there any other questions? Brett, are there any questions online or on the phone?

Chair, we have 2 questions online, both from [indiscernible]. The first question is, can you please elaborate on your initiatives targeting operational efficiency improvements?

I might suggest that we ask Anne-Marie that one. What do you think?

Okay. Yes.

Operational improvements, CI, continuous improvement. So Anne-Marie, our Chief Operations Officer, will answer that. Yes, absolutely. Thank you.

In terms of operational efficiencies, we've actually got a continuous improvement program that we run through the business that's quite embedded. It's been operating now for just over 3 years. And our whole target is to engage all the way through the business. So we go for low-hanging fruit, and we look at ways that we can improve our processes all the way through. In addition to that, we also focus on our capital improvements and the capital program, the automation program that Andrew has outlined in his presentation as well, certainly goes a long way to driving our operational efficiencies through our business and making sure that we've got the ability to offset CPI increases, labor increases and the other costs that we see coming through on an annual basis.

Thanks, Anne-Marie. Brett, I think there was a second question.

Chair, the second question is for the auditor. Can you please disclose if AI processors were used in the auditing opinions this year.

Trent, maybe move to a mic so everyone can hear. Thanks.

As Chair, KPMG does use AI processes through our systems. We use that, in particular, to look for unusual transactions and matching of transactions. So we are looking to use the best of those sort of technologies to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our audit delivery.

Thank you, Trent. And thank you to Leila for both those questions. Brett, are there any other questions online?

No further questions online, Chair.

I will now move to the resolutions. So item 2 is the resolution to reelect Linda Bardow-Nicholls AO as a Non-Executive Director. The first resolution today concerns the reelection of Linda Bardow-Nicholls, as I just mentioned, as a Non-Executive Director of the company. Linda was first appointed as a Non-Executive Director on the 7 of October 2016 and was last elected by shareholders on the 4 of November 2021. Linda is currently a member of the Finance and Audit Committee, a member of the Risk and Sustainability Committee and a member of the People and Remuneration Committee and a member of the Nomination Committee. Linda has extensive and valuable experience as a Senior Executive and Director in banking, insurance and funds management in Australia, New Zealand and the United States gained over a career spanning over 30 years. The Board has reviewed Linda's performance and believes that she continues to provide a very valuable contribution to the Board and accordingly unanimously supports Linda's reelection. I would now like to invite Linda to say a few words in support of her reelection.

Thank you, Helen, and good morning. And to those of you who are here today in Sydney when it's raining, I live in Melbourne and no, I did not bring a rain with me, but it is a lovely sunny day in Melbourne apparently. As Helen noted, I became a Non-Executive Director of Inghams at the time of our becoming listed on the Australian Stock Exchange. I bought shares in the IPO. And like many of you, I've purchased shares in subsequent years because I believe that Inghams is a good investment with a sound future. I am on a number of committees. And for a number of years, I chaired the Finance and Audit Committee as well. My executive career was in finance. And I say finance because I wasn't always a banker. You don't say you're a banker. That's not very popular. And in very large organizations. I've been a professional Non-Executive Director of listed companies, large organizations for over 20 years. I think it's this diversity of experience and professionalism that I bring to Inghams. My Board experience includes health care as Chair of Healthscope and currently Chair of the Royal Melbourne Hospital. In Transport and Logistics, I was the Chair of Yara Trans for a decade and the Chair of Australia Post, where I served for 20 years. I also have deep experience in heavily regulated consumer businesses, including Fairfax Media, St. George Bank and currently Medibank. What distinguishes those 3 organizations is every consumer and politician has an opinion on your business and how they could run it better. Australia has some of the highest food safety standards and animal welfare standards in the world. We are a heavily regulated business. At Inghams, we know that reputation comes not by chance, but from adhering to exacting standards and managing risk for zero harm. Our very large customers, we've talked about them a bit this morning, supermarkets, the quick-serve restaurants. They expect competitive pricing. They expect innovative products and delivery on time and in full with no excuses. Meeting these expectations demands attention to detail in every step of production, transport and logistics, fields in which I have experience. Chicken is Australia's favorite meal and Australian consumers are discerning about what chicken they eat. Now I see this in my own 3-generation family, where there are definite views on chicken, and that's whether their preference is nuggets or the barbecue bird and I still have a sun we tease about buying the Bachelor's handbag or it's the Sunday roast. Consumers know how they like their chuck and so does my family. When consumers speak, importantly, Inghams listens. I believe my industry experience and current roles give me firsthand knowledge of the opportunities and challenges facing Inghams today. As a Board member, I see a critical part of my job as ensuring we make the numbers expected by investors and deliver the service, quality and value demanded by the community. To continue that work, I'd ask you to please support my reelection today. Thank you.

Thank you, Linda. I will now take questions on this item, starting with questions in the room. Are there any questions for Linda? Charlie?

Thank you. Just I suppose similar questions that I asked previously, Linda, but given you've been here since 2016, I think, since the float, the only one. Just be great to hear your thoughts as to the history of Inghams as a listed entity, why it hasn't been able to deliver any capital -- it's actually a capital loss for shareholders, noting your speech, et cetera, but you have seen the cycles and the troubles and COVID, et cetera. But what are your thoughts on the investment proposition for Inghams and why it hasn't been able to deliver sustainable capital gains for shareholders? And also just on that critical margin issue. I think how many CEOs have we had since listing 3 maybe, but you've obviously seen them all, and they've all presumably tried to...

It sounds like you're counting my ex-husbands.

Thank you, Cherry. I appreciate that. But yes, what are your thoughts on that margin issue? Why haven't we been able to actually get to the aspirational 10% and noting that I suppose in this environment, price rises for any sort of food item are clearly under scrutiny. So just be interested to know if we can actually rely upon that going forward or if there's a cost-out opportunity. But just appreciate your thoughts on those 2 issues, the range trade or lack thereof a capital gain and margins going forward.

Sure. Thanks for the question. I think the first thing I'd say is actions speak louder than words, and I keep buying shares. I mean you might the woman's it. No, I think this is a really good investment. The second thing I'd say is that over a span of time in business, you learn things and you hope you don't repeat your mistakes. Prior to joining the Board at Inghams, I had only sold businesses to private equity, and they have gone well. I think there are real challenges in buying businesses from private equity, and they don't get sorted out overnight. Now I'm not blaming TPG for all the issues, but we didn't start from a strong position. I do think that the current management team is doing a good job. I think they have exciting plans. I think these plans are coming to fruition. I think it is also challenging to be the only listed company in an industry where everything we do is on display relatively short term, and we have competitors who can take a much longer view on investment and realizing those returns. Now that's not a pity me line at all. That's a reality in our industry. It's a reality in many businesses in Australia. But I think we have a sound approach to increasing margin to improving EBITDA and convincing the market that they don't need to overreact on the downside. Why don't you buy some more shares?

I'll cover that [indiscernible].

Thanks, Charlie. Yes, of course, I was going to ask if there are any other questions. Please take the mic if you'd like to ask a question. Introduce yourself, please.

Sure. Darius [indiscernible], just a small shareholder. So actually, if I could start from listing, you mentioned that we didn't start at a strong position. I would like to -- if you could elaborate on that one going back to the history of TPG.

I think it's already been identified. In fact, Charlie really helped answer this question earlier when he talked about the experience of private equity going to IPO, not being able to sell down as much as they would have liked in the IPO. And so there was that period where there was an overhang on our stock for a number of years. Well, that was then, this is now. We've all grown up a lot since 2016, including the chicken industry.

Thank you. Are there any other questions in the room? Brett, are there any questions online for Linda?

Chair, there are no questions online.

Thank you, Brett. Moving to the proxy results. The proxy results are now shown on the screen, and I will pause briefly while you cast your vote. Okay. Thank you. Moving now to Item #3, which is the adoption of the remuneration report for the year-ended 29 of June 2024. The remuneration report is contained on Pages 70 to 93 of the annual report and sets out the remuneration policies of the company and reports on the remuneration arrangements in place for the company's executive KMP during the 2024 financial year. We are committed to ensuring the remuneration strategy reflects good governance, consultation with key stakeholders and is transparent and is designed to support the business strategy and drive sustainable outperformance for shareholders over the short, medium and long term. In the lead up to this year's AGM, I met with several stakeholders with Tim Longstaff to discuss the company's current remuneration plans and update ourselves on the key issues for investors. We find these meetings very informative and are a valuable input into the Board's decisions regarding executive remuneration. While the vote on the remuneration report is a nonbinding one, it remains a valuable source of feedback. The Board takes the discussions held during this part of the meeting and the outcome of the vote into account when setting remuneration policy for future years. I will now take questions on this item, starting with questions in the room. And Charlie, I think you might have a question.

Yes, I just have to get my stats in order, but thank you. I suppose 2 questions and noting the history of Inghams and when it was owned by the Inghams family, clearly, they were very much aligned being the owners and TPG when they owned it, they only really cared about generating a return, which clearly they did, sold a lot of assets and sold very well to the poor old share market funders who bought off a much higher price than where it is today. But going to that alignment point, and I think you all roughly have -- all the directors roughly have about 1 year's salaries worth of shares, which I suppose, most consider to be the sort of minimum standard and showing alignment. But Linda, not to pick on you, but you've been there since 2016 and you have a touch over your annual salary in shares. So the amount in terms of what you've been paid. And clearly, you've worked for that, but it does seem a bit misaligned in terms of the skin of the game, especially relative to when Inghams did do well and deliver big returns for their owners, the Inghams family and the TPG entity. They clearly made a very big return, but it does seem a bit misaligned today relative to the amount of shares that the Board does own relative to what you get paid. So just appreciate any thoughts on that, please? Do you feel misaligned or given that it is in line with 1 year's pay, which I suppose is in line with what some of the proxy houses may say is fair, but clearly a lot less aligned than when Inghams is doing well to previous owners?

Yes. I mean I'm happy to give you a comment on that. I mean we look to external benchmarking every year across both executive and nonexecutive rem. And we look to be in line with what's happening in the market, and we adjust over a period of time accordingly. So I think when we look at the shareholding requirement, all of the directors have met that. I think what you're potentially challenging, which is not unreasonable, but you're challenging a market standard. So if you -- this is something where I think that you may see it move over time where directors have more than a year's shareholding. But I think at this point in time, I think the Board is very comfortable that all of us have skin in the game, take it very seriously. This Board works incredibly hard, way above and beyond the meetings on the -- in the piece of paper in the annual report, incredibly diligent and hard-working and committed way over and above what they get paid. So I think what we're doing is in line with best practice and everyone feels and walks in the shoes of shareholders because we are shareholders on a day-to-day basis.

And then just second question. I think one of the performance hurdles for the LTIs is relative shareholder performance. Is that correct? 50% of the vesting is relative, which again, if TPG was owning it or the Inghams family, if the market fell 10 and we fell 5, I don't think they'd be cheering about that. They would say we fell 5 because they care about absolute hurdles and noting that the starting point today is $3 per share seems a little bit soft, and I know you could probably say that it's in line with other big companies, but a lot of big companies also deliver 0 capital gain to negative capital gain over the long term. So I would hope that an absolute shareholder return is more the focus because, again, when the previous owners did well, they cared about absolute returns. So just maybe it's more of a comment, but it feels like the relative shareholder return going forward is a bit of a soft target. Any comment?

Yes. Charlie, this one is a really hard one because for all of the -- I mean, there are challenges with every metric, as you know. Remember, we have 2. So we have 50% against ROIC, which is the real measure against our capital invested in the business over the medium to long term. Relative shareholder return for the advocates of absolute TSR, there are those that descent against relative TSR and vice versa. So of course, you have to look at the yield from our dividends and share price growth against what we have refreshed very recently a relevant benchmark group of about 15 companies in there. So it's not a perfect measure. We do think it's slightly more relevant to us than absolute TSR. But remember, we have the balance of the 2 metrics, which, to your point, really is the capital returns measure over the medium to long term.

Are there any other questions on the rem report in the room? Brett, do we have any questions online for this resolution?

There's no questions online for this item.

Okay. No questions online. Thank you. I'll move now to the proxy results. Proxy results are now shown on the screen, and I will pause briefly while you cast your vote. Moving to Item #4, which is the resolution around the F '25 to '27 LTIP grant to the CEO. The company's LTIP schemes are designed to align the interest of the CEO and Managing Director with the interest of shareholders by providing the opportunity to receive an equity interest in the company through the granting of performance rights. Each performance right entitles the CEO to receive one fully paid ordinary share in the company, subject to meeting specified performance conditions. Consistent with the prior years, the LTIP scheme is based on a combination of underlying pre-AASB 16 return on invested capital and relative total shareholder return as the 2 equally weighted performance measures. As I outlined earlier, there is no change to the relative TSR measure. In relation to ROIC, we are updating the calculation of net operating profit after tax to remove the interest cost component relating to the trade payable facility that forms part of the NOPAT calculation. You will find a detailed explanation in our Notice of Meeting and the performance conditions for this plan can be found in both the annual report and the Notice of Meeting. We will now take questions on this item, starting with [Audio Gap]. Brett, are there any questions online or on the phone?

Chair, there are no questions online or on the phone for this item.

Thank you, Brett. Moving to the proxy results. Proxy results are now shown on the screen, and I'll pause briefly while you cast your vote. Before we move to general business, I would like to advise that at the conclusion of the discussion, voting will close. If you've not already done so, can I please ask you now to complete your votes for all resolutions. Thank you. Moving now to general business. Shareholders are now invited to ask general questions regarding the company. Thank you to those investors who sent questions in prior to the meeting. Before I take questions from the room, I would like to respond to those questions we received that have not been addressed elsewhere in the presentation. The first question relates to whether Inghams has plans to introduce a dividend reinvestment plan in the future. The Board and management team constantly review the capital requirements of the business. While we do not have any current intention to introduce a dividend reinvestment plan, should we decide that commencing such a plan is in the interest of the company and its capital requirements, we will advise shareholders by way of an ASX announcement at that time. The second question asks if we have any plans to expand outside of Australia and New Zealand. While we actively consider growth opportunities in Australia and New Zealand during the course of any given year, as evidenced by the 2 New Zealand acquisitions that we've undertaken over the last year, the Board and management are focused on driving the performance and the growth of the existing business, and we have no current plans to expand operations outside of our core markets. We received 2 questions that relate to somewhat interrelated topics of managing biosecurity risks and the broader issue of how we ensure continuity of supply to our customers. In considering first the question of supply continuity, our approach encompasses a number of key elements. Putting aside for a minute, the important element of biosecurity, network structure and business planning are key elements of our approach. Operating a geographically diverse network of farms and facilities helps effectively mitigate the impact of localized operational disruptions that may occur from time to time. Proactive business planning, including demand forecasting, inventory management and supply chain optimization enables Inghams to effectively respond to our customer requirements and market fluctuations. Our approach to biosecurity encompasses many elements from the intentionally geographically dispersed nature of our operations through to the daily biosecurity procedures observed by every employee on every site. We also work closely with the federal and state authorities as part of our contribution to the broader poultry meat industry. This would be an appropriate point for me to comment on the outbreak of bird flu in Australia in the middle of the year. You will no doubt have seen our updates to the ASX in May and June of this year. I am pleased to report that Inghams was unaffected by this event, a fact that reflects the combined benefits of the design of our network, our rigorous biosecurity protocol and the enhanced operational measures that we quickly put in place by our highly experienced team. For now, we remain vigilant and the business is running as usual. The final question we received was on animal welfare. This is a core priority for Inghams, and our goal is to achieve global best practice in animal health and welfare on scientifically validated health and welfare outcomes. In addition to maintaining high biosecurity standards, our approach includes implementing responsible husbandry practices and providing nutritious feed and water. Inghams adheres to strict animal welfare guidelines and certifications such as the RSPCA approved farming screen in Australia and the SPCA certified in New Zealand and also invest in research and development to improve animal health and well-being. You will find more information on our latest sustainability report, which is contained in the 2024 annual report. I will now take any other general questions in the room. Are there any questions? Charlie?

Yes. Thank you. Just thinking through some of the comments around being listed and we're at a disadvantage. We're the only listed chicken company. So maybe, yes, that is a disadvantage. But could you just talk to that point to somebody on the Board or management given more reports, Baiada, our biggest competitor is doing well. And again, they don't have to report how much they're making, et cetera, which, yes, I'm sure Woolies loves seeing and everybody else loves seeing. And I think Baiada do have a very large property portfolio, which we don't. But just maybe if we could just touch on the benefits of remaining listed. I don't think we have actually raised any new equity since IPO, which credits the Board. That's always good when we don't get diluted apart from when TPG sold to us or sold to the public. But yes, maybe just on the benefits of remaining listed given we don't or haven't yet needed to raise any new equity and are we at a to our key competitor in Baiada and Stegles as a result?

I think Linda covered this very well earlier. But clearly, we have access to both the equity market and the debt market as being a publicly listed company. And that, of course, we have a very strong balance sheet at the moment with opportunities to grow. The disadvantage, I think Linda explained very well in that there's a lot of our information that is public and a lot of our information we're reporting, obviously, on a biannual basis, whereas Baiada aren't. So they're a closed book. So Inghams is, of course, fully transparent with a lot of our strategy and our financials, whereas Baiada don't need to be. So what you may hear externally from Baiada is not necessarily verifiable, whereas what you hear from Inghams, of course, is.

So are we at a disadvantage to our chief competitor should...

We're at a disadvantage from an information reporting point of view.

But on balance, being listed is a good thing for Inghams, just noting that we haven't actually made a capital gain for shareholders since being listed. So on balance, all those things considered, is it a good thing or?

Look, I think that we have a very clear strategy, and we've talked about we have opportunities to grow, and we see that we can absolutely do that as a publicly listed company. Are there any other questions in the room? Yes.

My name is Gordon, I'm a shareholder. I just want to make a comment about your latest bird flu overseas, Australia is the only one that has escaped that. And I feel that, that is dragging the share price down most definitely.

So thank you for your question or your comment, Gordon. Yes. So you think that the potential of the next strain is affecting. Yes. Well, there is no doubt that bird flu is something that we all have to live with. I think that we've got, as I commented earlier, very strong protocols and procedures around it that have protected Inghams to date. I think Andrew's comment earlier about the effect on our current share price from the Woolworths agreement has impacted our share price. And as Andrew also stated, we hope that today's trading update will instill some confidence that we're working our way very successfully through that transition. But I note your comment. Thank you. Are there any other questions on general business? As there are no further questions, I'm just going to check with Brett. Are there any further questions online or on the phone?

There are no questions online, Chair.

No. Okay. As there are no further questions, voting is now closed, and I declare the Annual General Meeting of the Inghams Group Limited closed. On behalf of the Board, thank you very much for joining us on this wet day. Have a good day. Thank you.