Pick n Pay Stores Limited (PIK) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Okay. Good morning, everybody. Welcome to the Pick n Pay AGM. This is our 52nd Annual General Meeting of the members. And this AGM is going to be conducted exclusively in the virtual environment via the Lumi electronic communication system. Thank you very much for joining us. And I just want to run through very briefly the agenda for this morning. I'm going to start off with a welcoming address. We're then going to go through all the resolutions. And I just suggest if you have questions on the resolutions, you actually can start entering them now, but we'll deal with all the questions on all the resolutions first. And then we're going to go through them one by one. We're not going to stop for additional questions, and we will ask you to vote on them. Once we finish all the resolutions, Richard Brasher, our CEO, is going to give an overview of the business. Then at the end, after Richard's concluded, Suzanne Ackerman-Berman will give an update on our Feed the Nation project and our foundation and the work that we've been doing. We'll then move to questions. And on the 2 -- and then when those are concluded, we'll announce the results of the AGM. We're scheduled to run for a maximum of an hour and a half, but if we need to run longer, I'm sure we can make a plan and do so. So that's -- I'd just like to now then just move on to my opening statement, which I will just read to you. We'll take a couple of moments. Good morning, and welcome to the 2020 Pick n Pay Annual General Meeting. This is the first AGM that we have conducted in this way. It is all online. There is no physical meeting. We will assess how this meeting goes to look at the conduct of our future AGMs. We have also released an earnings update this morning, which will be covered in our CEO presentation a little bit later. While we don't usually issue an update at the time of the AGM, these are special circumstances and we felt the need to do it this year. Having our AGM online is one of the countless examples of how COVID-19 pandemic has profoundly changed our lives and the way we do things. In part, it is incumbent upon us to embrace this new normal, which, despite the significant challenges and disruptions, may also present new opportunities. The pandemic has brought us -- has brought about so much damage to our lives, our health, our well-being, our finances, our jobs and our institutions. No one is untouched with it -- by it, and many of us have lost loved ones, family, friends and colleagues. And at this juncture, I'd just like to move away slightly from my script and just acknowledge my parents who've also had the COVID. My mother has recovered. And our founder, Raymond Ackerman, is still recovering from it, and we wish him the best recovery in the near future. From having a few confirmed cases through March and April, our country is now among the worst affected in the world, ranking in the top 5. The experts say we may now be in the eye of the storm, the peak of the pandemic. The next 2 months will be challenging to say the least for us as a nation, as a business community and the society at large. The challenges facing governments around the world have been advanced. The circumstances have been unprecedented. The stakes have never been higher. Many governments have been faced with the dilemma of saving lives by imposing hard lockdowns and saving livelihoods by keeping open as much of the economy as possible. I applaud our President for his courage in facing up to tough choices and making tough decisions. He promised consultation and cooperation between government and all stakeholders. I salute the way he has emphasized over and over again that we are all in this together, that we will only survive if we stay together and we will triumph in the end, but only if we stay together. I believe the Pick n Pay Group has stepped up to the plate and shown the tenacity, determination and togetherness that the President has demanded. I want to pay particular tribute to all my colleagues in the Pick n Pay Group who have stepped up magnificently to fulfill our responsibility as one of the essential service providers through the national state of disaster and through the lockdown. Through all the challenges and tribulations, we have continued to feed the nation. The public knows that. Whatever else may be uncertain, Pick n Pay and Boxer will be there for them. All my colleagues on the Board join me in saluting you, the Pick n Pay team, for your work. Thank you. Of course, we have not done this alone. It has been a national effort. The consumer goods industry has shown great resilience, and I'm proud to be the Co-Chair of the Consumer Goods Council of South Africa. Our emergency services, and in particular our health workers around the country, have shown enormous heroism. They can be justly proud that to-date, South Africa has experienced far fewer deaths from COVID-19 than many other countries around the world. More widely, our customers, alongside millions of others around the country, have shown solidarity by behaving responsibly, wearing their face masks and observing the physical distancing and other restrictions that we and others have had to introduce to safeguard lives. We've also seen unprecedented acts of generosity in all walks of life to alleviate some of the suffering the pandemic has caused. As one of many examples, our Feed the Nation initiative has channeled over ZAR 67 million into food hampers with donations from many customers and companies, our family, executives and from Pick n Pay. We've been able to provide close to 17, 1-7, million meals. This has been the largest humanitarian effort that the Pick n Pay Group has undertaken in its 53-year history. We will show you some of what we have done at the end of today's presentations. I believe that a sense of togetherness has kept our country strong despite the enormous disruption and challenges that so many people have faced. I'm also delighted that in doing what South Africa expects of us during the pandemic, we have not lost sight of our sustainability commitments and achievements. Our 2025 packaging targets remain well on track. We were the first retailer to sign up to the global 10x20x30 Food Waste Initiative. We have reduced our energy use per square meter by 37% against our 2008 baseline. We've become far more water-efficient. We sold 2 million reusable shopping bags last year made out of recycled plastic bottles. Our nude fruit and vegetables have been a hit with our customers. We've donated 1,600 tonnes of edible food to FoodForward, which is worth about ZAR 80 million. And we've diverted 60% of our waste from landfill. These are all things to celebrate. For all that we lack in South Africa, we do not lack resilience. We do not lack the capacity to pull together. We do not lack the ability to find creative ways to make the best of an immensely tough situation. But none of us mistake these qualities for granted. For our part, we will continue to work our hardest to ensure our stores are safe, our shelves are well-stocked and our prices are fair. I will reiterate the commitment we gave at the beginning of the crisis. We will never use a crisis like the current one as an excuse to raise our prices artificially. We will always give our best value to our customers. For the government, I believe that most of us ask no more than that its decisions are taken for the right reasons, are justified by the facts and that these facts are explained to us when decisions seem difficult to understand. The government has, on several occasions, reassured that they are listening and consulting, but we see little evidence of this. We need governance -- government should take us into their confidence when it comes to decisions that affect us all. We cannot afford decisions that are poorly made or poorly explained. They create confusion and cynicism and a relative togetherness on which we all depend. It is inevitable in this context that I mention the prohibitions on the sale of alcohol and tobacco. I do not do this because the prohibitions hurt our sales and cash flow. Well, that is true that they do, and Richard will explain a bit more of that later. I focus on it because more than any other decision taken by government during this pandemic, these prohibitions risk creating cynicism and divisions that we, as a country, cannot afford. South Africa is virtually the only country in the world that has prohibited the sale of these products during the pandemic. There has been no explanation as to why South Africa is right and so many other countries are wrong. What explanations we have been given have been confusing and contradictory. And sadly, everybody knows that tobacco and liquor remain readily available through the black market. So the policy achieves no end other than to fuel illegal activity, which ignores any regulatory safeguards and contributes not a single cent to our beleaguered tax deficit, which desperately needs the revenue for the state to meet its huge socioeconomic obligations. Whatever reasoning put forward by government, it is inordinately outweighed by the cynicism that it has created. I implore the government to review its decisions and to look at the issue in the sprit of responsibility and togetherness that the President has so rightly upheld. In these circumstances, managing the economic recovery will require a great deal of finesse and extraordinary focus on rapid implementation of reforms, which the government has already committed to. The government will have farmed -- will have to be far more depth in getting the economy back in its feet. It will have to recognize its limitations and withdraw from controls it has put in place, play to its strengths and allow citizens and the private sector to play to theirs. Thus, unleashing the creative energy of the whole society. We have to learn to live with the virus while we grow the economy. And for this to happen, the government will have to rely more on persuasion and cooperation and less on control. We must harness the energy and innovation of all South Africans with a focus on critical reinvigoration, not overregulation. As my father has often said, leadership means taking people from where they are to where you want them to be. What we saw was inspiring leadership from government in the early days of this pandemic, and we would hope to see a return to this very soon. Whilst I'm not given to quoting politicians, our Finance Minister has captured what the country is thinking, that it's time for our leadership to lead without fear, favor or prejudice because in failing to trust our citizens, the spirit of Ubuntu in South Africa risks being relegated to a history boot -- into a history book footnote. We're all in this together. Managing through this crisis is difficult. We must focus not only on immediate needs, but on how we can survive and hopefully thrive off the crisis. We must take the right decisions now to safeguard the future. That's why in May, after much deliberation, we took the difficult decision to defer our annual dividend. We understand that many shareholders rely on their dividends to supplement their incomes. We will review the situation just as soon as we have greater clarity on our cash flows later in the year. It is 10 years since I became Chairman of Pick n Pay. We have made enormous changes for the better. We are a very different company today and a much better one. We are much better able to weather the storm. Our values have remained strong, and they mean that even in the middle of the storm, we help our customers and communities first. Within our business, our people have demonstrated true commitment and our execution has been phenomenal under extraordinary pressure. We have learned better than ever how to work as a team. At the fore of our response to the crisis is our CEO, Richard Brasher, and his executive team. Richard deserves enormous credit for his leadership over the last 7 years and especially during this crisis. He has earned huge respect, both internally and externally, and deservedly so. Richard had planned to announce his retirement from Pick n Pay at our annual results in May. However, he's elected to once again roll up his sleeves and help us navigate this crisis. We have started the process to find his successor in good time. As with so much else, COVID-19 has disrupted this process, but we're making progress and we'll make an announcement when we are ready to do so. At the 2019 AGM, we undertook to review and refresh the composition of our Board. And to this end, we announced 3 new Board appointments. Mariam Cassim and Dr. Haroon Bhorat joined the Board on the 18th of May as Independent Nonexecutive Directors. And effective today, the 4th of August, Annemarie van der Merwe will also be joining us as a Nonexecutive Director. She will be replacing Alex Mathole. All 3 bring with them a wealth of experience from a wide variety of roles and experience, and we are delighted they have agreed to join us. We would also particularly like to thank Alex Mathole for her valuable contribution over the years and wish her luck in her executive career into the future. After many years as Lead Independent Director, Hugh Herman has stood down from that role and Jeff van Rooyen has been appointed to the role of Lead Independent Director. We thank Hugh for his ongoing support and advice, and I'm pleased that he will be remaining on the Board and retaining his role as Chairman of rem com as a member of the audit committee. I would also like to formally welcome Lerena Olivier into the role of Chief Financial Officer. Lerena took over from Bakar Jakoet in September last year, and we congratulate her on her appointment. We are already benefiting from her contribution as an Executive Director on the Board. The coming year will be a challenge to us all, from the Board to those who serve at the frontlines. We have the energy, the commitment and the values to work as hard as we can to serve our customers with efficiency, with empathy and with dedication. Thank you for listening to me. So if we can now move on to the formal part of the agenda. And we'll go through it as quickly as possible, but we will make sure that there is plenty of time for questions. The quorum for this meeting is 3 members personally present and entitled to vote, who between them hold in excess of 25% of the issued shares. I declare that the necessary quorum is present and I declare that the meeting is duly constituted. Because this meeting is held in a virtual environment, I've arranged for a Director who is also a shareholder to second all the resolutions. Aboubakar Jakoet has agreed to second all the motions at today's meetings. In light of this, with your agreement, I will dispense with the usual formalities of asking for a second for all resolutions. I nominate Computershare to act as scrutineers for the purposes of the poll. In accordance with good governance, the voting on all resolutions at the meeting will be conducted by a poll. This is to ensure that the respective shareholdings of shareholders are fairly and accurately reflected in the voting. Shareholders or their proxies or representatives present would have registered on the Lumi electronic platform to be able to vote on the resolutions. After taking questions on the matters being voted on the meeting, resolutions will be open for voting. Each shareholder or proxy representatives will then be able to cast its vote for each of the resolutions on the electronic platform. I will announce the results of the voting after Richard Brasher and Suzanne have given their presentation -- results have been determined. The results will be posted on SENS after the conclusion of the meeting. The notice convening this AGM has been in your hands for the prescribed period, having been posted by registered post to shareholders on the 6th of July 2020. The notice contains full details of all the resolutions to be considered at this meeting. There have been no changes to the proposed resolutions. I propose that the notice be taken as read. We're now going to take questions on the resolutions. Please submit your questions electronically. If you have questions of a general nature, please submit them once the resolutions have been voted on. We will vote -- any questions of a general nature until after the voting has concluded so we can attend to the business of the meeting. So we'll now move to the questions.

First question, which we'll deal with afterwards. And the second question we'll deal with towards at the end. The third question is from [ as you probably hear ] is, as you may appreciate, there's been some apprehension regarding replacement of Mr. Brasher as the CEO. When did the Board members first learn about Mr. Brasher's departure? Why is Mr. Brasher leaving? What measures are in place to find a successor for Mr. Brasher? Will the first -- post be filled internally, locally or will internal candidates also be considered? And I will answer the question. Richard gave us at least 12 months notice prior to May. At our meeting in the middle of last year, he told us he was going. We've then looked at an international global search process where we are looking internally, locally and internationally. We, as I've said, we haven't yet made a decision on the person who will be taking the place where [ as we're very front on ] the track and we have been looking at all 3 of those categories. Mr. Brasher is leaving because when he first joined, he said to me that he was just going to be around for a 5-year gig, even though he said we didn't put an end to it. He has been around for over 7 years now and he feels that he wants to be part and spend more time with his family. And he's not taking up a role with anybody else, as can be seen, that he's actually decided to extend his stay due to COVID to help us through the crisis as we weren't able to conclude the search. And I think we've got a really good process going. The Board is fully engaged in the process. And hopefully, we'll have an answer in the not too distant future. So the third question is on remuneration issues. And the question is please address the following questions as raised in previous AGMs. The remuneration policy is insufficiently disclosed. The lack of disclosure on the STI and LTI performance measures, weightings and target levels, shareholders cannot judge between the various performance levels. There's no minimum shareholder requirement for Directors. The termination policy on variable remuneration is not provided. Exact remuneration at various levels of performance is not provided. The STI cap for the CEO seems high at 36x monthly salary. The STI remuneration should have a portion of deferred interest shares and the share options granted are not subjected to any performance measures. So I'm going to ask our Chairman of our rem com to answer the question and then we'll come in with any -- to fill in any holes that Hugh may have got. So Hugh, if you could please answer the question?

Well, it's not a question. It's a series of questions. And let me say that all of these things do take our attention. And it would appear to me the [ describe having ] is not now because it requires quite a lengthy explanation is we will be consulting with shareholders after the meeting because the requisite number of votes in regard to remuneration committee have not been obtained. So we are required to consult and we will consult it through with shareholders and go through all these issues. But I can assure, the person who raised the question is a newbie, that all of these points have been taken under consideration. Some of them, we don't think it appropriate to deal with. Others we have dealt with. And in fact, the remuneration committee report sets out details in quite some considerable length as to what we do in regard to [ dispensing ] the short-term incentive and long-term incentive key performance measures and the weightings, but we will go through this in person with the shareholders after this meeting.

Okay. Thank you, Hugh. I don't think there's a need to go into it any further now because we are going to be giving the real detailed report to everybody who wants to engage with us on our follow-up afterwards. Okay. Next question. Also again from [indiscernible] the remuneration report. Without clear target, it is difficult to measure how the current COVID will impact executive remuneration and retain talent.

Well, what we have done that. And we have said that this is something that's going to be looked at on an ongoing basis now because the impact of COVID is a moving thought. And obviously, it's got a very serious effect on all businesses. And we do have clear targets, but we are having to look at whether or not we should have bent those targets, bearing in mind the current climate. And there will be an update given to shareholders about this.

Okay. Any -- are there any other questions coming through now? Okay. I'd just remind you that we're not going to take questions on the individual resolutions as we go through them, so that's why we're requesting that they come through beforehand.

Okay. If there are no further questions, we'll then move on to the actual resolutions and the meeting. The minutes of the last AGM were held -- which was held on Monday, the 29th of July 2019, were approved at the Board meeting held on the 14th of October 2019. These minutes were then posted on our website. Once the minutes of this 2020 Annual General Meeting have been approved by the Board on the 19th of October 2020, they will also be posted on the website for your review. We have received various apologies, and these will be recorded in the minutes. We shall now proceed with the business of the meeting. I confirm that the electronic system is now open for voting. Please cast your votes. You can do so while I'm proposing the resolutions. Alternatively, you can vote during the period or after all the resolutions have been proposed. I would advise when the voting closes. I now propose the following special and ordinary resolutions as set out in the notice convening this meeting. Given the length of resolutions, [ please now ] take them as read. There will be further resolutions in the notice as they will be proposed as set out in the notice. Resolution 1, to present the audited financial statements, the Directors' report and the Audit and Risk and Compliance Committee's report of the company for the 2020 annual financial period. Please, could you vote on ordinary resolution -- on that -- sorry, that's not a vote. The first ordinary resolution is ordinary resolution #1, which is the appointment of the external auditors. The audit committee recommended to the Board, which accepts the recommendation of the company-proposed Ernst & Young Inc. be reappointed as external auditors for the company with [ Tanner Rutledge ] as the designated partner. Shareholders or proxies who have not yet cast their votes may do so now. [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2, the reappointment and appointment of Directors. The Directors who retired by rotation are Hugh Herman, Jeff van Rooyen and myself. In addition, Lerena Olivier, our new CFO, offers herself for election as an Executive Director. And we have a number of new Nonexecutive Directors who have joined our Board during the past few months: Bakar Jakoet, Mariam Cassim, Haroon Bhorat and Annemarie van der Merwe, all being eligible or offer themselves for election. So ordinary resolution #2.1, the appointment a Hugh Herman as a Director for a 1-year term. And the reason for a 1-year term is Hugh has been on the Board for longer than 12 years and all Directors over 12 years get elected on an annual basis -- sorry, older than 9 years get elected on an annual basis. So please, can you vote for Hugh now if you haven't done so already? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution 2.2 for Jeff van Rooyen, same story as with Hugh, for a 1-year term. And I'm proposing the election of Jeff as a Director. Any shareholders who have not yet cast their vote may do so now. [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2.3. Jeff van Rooyen, as our Lead Independent Director, is going to make -- is proposing that I get reelected as a Director. Shareholders or proxies who have not yet cast their vote may do so now. [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2.4, Lerena Olivier as Executive Director. If I suggest shareholders and proxies who have not yet cast their vote may do so now. [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2.5. I propose the election of Bakar Jakoet as a Director for a 3-year term. And please, could you vote now? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2.6. I propose the election of Mariam Cassim as a Director for a 3-year term. Please, could you do your vote? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #2.7, the appointment of Haroon Bhorat as a Director for a 3-year term. [Audio Gap] Ordinary resolution #2.8, the appointment of Annemarie van der Merwe as a Director for a 3-year term. Please, could you cast your vote? [Voting]

Now ordinary resolution #3, which is the appointment of the risk, audit and compliance committee members for the 2020 annual financial period. As recommended by the Board, I propose the election of Jeff van Rooyen as Chairman; Hugh Herman [Audio Gap] Mariam Cassim as Directors of the audit, risk and compliance committee for the ensuing year. So we're going to go on -- by individual member. The appointment of -- I propose the election of Jeff van Rooyen as a member of the audit, risk and compliance committee. Please, could you cast your vote? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #3.2. I propose the election of Hugh Herman as a member of the audit, risk and compliance committee. Please cast your votes. [Voting]

Ordinary [Audio Gap] Mothupi as a member of the audit, risk and compliance committee. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #3.4. I propose the election of David Friedland as a member of the audit, risk and compliance committee. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #3.5. I propose the election of Mariam Cassim as a member of the audit, risk and compliance committee. Please cast your vote. [Voting]

Sorry. An advisory note, point #5, is the remuneration report for the 2020 annual financial period. The directors table the remuneration report for the 2020 annual financial period. The full remuneration policy and report is set out in the integrated annual report published on our website on the 3rd of July 2020. In terms of King IV, we have split the advisory vote on remuneration into 2 votes, one for remuneration policy and the other for our report on the implementation of our remuneration policy during the financial year. In the event that 25% or more of the voting right exercised are cast against these resolutions, the Board will invite dissenting shareholders to engage with the remuneration committee on their concerns in line with the provisions of the JSE Listing Requirements. So ordinary resolution #4.1. I propose the endorsement of the company's remuneration policy for the 2020 annual financial period. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #4.2, the endorsement of the remuneration implementation report. I propose the endorsement of it. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Special resolution #1, Directors' fees. I propose that the Directors' fees for the 2021 and 2022 annual financial periods be approved. It is proposed that the Directors' fees remain unchanged for the 2021 financial year, that's for this year, and be increased by CPI in the 2022 annual financial period. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Special resolution #7 -- sorry, special resolution #2. Special resolution #2.1, provision of financial assistance to related or interrelated companies. I propose that the company approves financial assistance to related or interrelated companies. Please cast your votes. [Voting]

Special resolution #2.2. I propose that the company approves financial assistance to qualifying employees of the companies in the Pick n Pay Group in terms of the company's existing housing loan policy. Please cast your votes. [Voting]

Special resolution #2.2, provision of financial assistance to persons. I propose that the company approves financial assistance to qualifying employees of the companies in the Pick n Pay Group in terms of the company's existing housing loan policy. Please cast your votes. [Voting]

Special resolution #3, which is concerning the amendment of the Forfeitable Share Plan. I propose that the rules of the FSP are amended to allow the remuneration committee to vary the entitlement of participants to voting and dividend rights during the vesting period. Please cast your votes. [Voting]

Special resolution #4. I propose that the company approves the general approval to repurchase company shares. Please cast your vote. [Voting]

Ordinary resolution #4, Directors' authority to implement special and ordinary resolutions. I propose that each and every Director of the company be so authorized to implement the resolutions passed at this meeting. Please, could you cast your votes? [Voting]

Item 11 of the notice offers to transact such other business as may be transacted by an Annual General Meeting. Are there any matters not already covered that members wish to raise? We're going to do -- we'll deal with those at the end of the session. If anybody wishes to raise any questions, you can do -- please post your questions onto the chat line. So at this stage, I'm going to move on and ask our CEO, Richard Brasher, to address us. And he's got a short presentation for us. Thank you very much for your cooperation, everybody.

Thank you, Chairman. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. This -- it's been a strange year, and this is another strange event in the strange year. So what I'd like to do is going to be different. We normally, at this stage, would just go through last year's annual results. We will take you through some of the points of interest in our business and tell you about -- tell you about the plans that we have for the future. What I'd like to do is when I started thinking about this, last year seems another lifetime. So I'm going to be very brief on last year's results and spend a lot more time on what we are doing right here right now. So if you look at last year's results, I believe that they were a good performance in a very difficult market. Turnover growth of 4.7% of the group was improved in South Africa by 5.1%. Strength of the South African coal safeguarded our earnings and margin in a constrained economic plant. 2-year compound growth market as we gained market share in the year before. Our South African comparable PBT was up 5.2%, which I thought was a very credible performance and one that I was very proud that the team delivered for shareholders. Our internal selling price was maintained at 2.6%, well below CPI, and that's continued the trend that we've been developing over the last 3 years. Greater operating efficiency and cost control mitigated cost inflation though we did experience significant challenges in Africa, mainly due to hyperinflation in Zimbabwe and serious currency devaluations in a number of other countries. But overall, I did feel that last year was a good performance. And I certainly felt that on a 2-year compound growth, it demonstrated that we improved quite meaningfully against our plan. So if you look at the context of our plan, which is over a 7-year period, which is my tenure, I'm very pleased with the steady growth. As you can see from the charts that we put on the screen, it's been steady in terms of our growth and turnover. We've had strong growth in our PBT. Our return on capital employed has been strong. Our headlines earnings per share has grown. We declared dividends in an increasing basis over the last few years. And I note the comments of the Chairman regarding the dividend that we deferred earlier this year. We've invested more than ZAR 10 billion in expanding the business. We've opened over 800 stores. And I'm really, really pleased that we created over that time period over 20,000 new jobs within our group. So that was a very simple summary of the performance last year and the performance over the last 7 years, which has put us in a strong position to deal with the situation we now find ourselves. Now you'll note that last year was all about -- was not had -- had no impact of COVID in. And you'll know that the COVID actually started in the country in the middle of March. And therefore, 5.5 months of our first half results will have contained an element of COVID in them. What I'm particularly pleased about and proud about the leadership is the dedication they've now shown over the last 4.5 months since lockdown. It's 131 days. As it reminded me, I've not worn a tie for 131 days, it just felt slightly unusual, but I've managed to dig one out today because the protocol requires. But what we have done through our stores, we said we would stay open. We would stay safe, we would stay full, and we would stay working. And so far, in that 131 days, the team have played an extremely good game, and we've achieved all of that. All of our stores will remain open. We have created an environment that's both safe for our staff and safe for our customers. The stores have been stocked and in the main -- full of the products that people require. We've reengineered our digital platforms to actually significantly expand our online business over the period, and I'll touch on that a bit later. And we fulfilled a role of essential service, I believe, with distinction and done a great job both for our staff and for our customers. You'll hear a bit later after I've made the short presentation on Feed the Nation campaign from Suzanne Ackerman, which is something extremely proud of and is actually at the heart of the values of the company. We acted very promptly early on in the pandemic, and we preserved our cash. We've shown tight control of our capital and a keen focus on critical costs and operational spend. And that as a consequence, we deferred our dividend, and I'll come back to that also shortly. I believe that our business remains strong and stable and well placed to serve customers and shareholders going forward. As I said to you last year, it feels like a lifetime ago, but our financial year started on the 1st of March. So on the 15th of March, it was announced that we were going into a state of disaster, and it was on the 26th of March that actually lockdown. The characterization of the impact of pre-lockdown was beginning with disruption of imports out of China, given that this started in China, before it came to the rest of the world. There was a brief period of panic buying between the 15 and the 26, and you'll see that reported by other retailers, including Pick n Pay. And that spike in demand, as you well know, look to personal hygiene, nonperishable foods, household items, liquor, tobacco, and let's not forget, toilet tissue. There were some temporary out of stock, but I'm pleased with the support of the supply chain and our suppliers. Those were temporary rather than permanent. And we did impose -- self-imposed quantity limits to mitigate some of the shortages, and there was a significant up weighting in terms of hygiene measures that were adopted in the process. We then went into lockdown and we saw the suspension of nonessential sectors. We saw reduced household expenditure as everybody locked down and tightened down. And customers shopped a lot less frequently than they were used to. They shopped in fewer stores, but they did generally buy bigger baskets. You heard from the Chairman, the prohibition of the sale of goods, liquor, tobacco, clothing and most of general merchandise products, had an impact of approximately 20% of the overall sales of the company is produced from those categories, especially our clothing stores, our liquor stores as well as the impact on general merchandise. Prohibition did affect the sales and therefore, affected our margin. What we also did in that time period is we ramped up our support for our front-line workers. Not only did we pay an appreciation bonus, we also provided them with masks before it was mandated and also putting in screens and ways in which we could ensure social distancing within our stores. And then we moved to Level 3, 1st of June, rising cases nationally, which is currently where we still are, although there are some signs of hope that we may be reaching the peak of this terrible virus. But the disruption to shopping continues. We have focused on mitigating the disruption of suppliers to store. The sale clothing and general merchandise is now permitted, but tobacco and liquor sales are currently not permitted, although briefly liquor was available June -- month of June but we are currently lockdown as we were a bit full. There were -- next slide. There was -- there's been quite a lot of behavioral shift and also we monitor very closely how our customers are feeling. What they do is they hold a version of what politicians or governments talk about within their own households. The concern about health, the concern about their livelihood and their concern about the economy. So all of those things are held in the households of South Africa. It's meant that people are more cautious and selective in what they buy that there is significant price sensitivity. And obviously, that depends on the level of income of the household is exactly how sensitive they are and people who got very little or virtually nothing. And they're incredibly sensitive, and they have to trade-off the balance between how many places they go shopping, how often that they shop and obviously, the market follows when the cash is in town, and those states are very clearly understood and known in this country. People are taking fewer trips, bigger baskets, as I mentioned, and there is a lot more consumption in home. Obviously, with hospitalities being originally closed entirely, and now opening up people still feel a nervousness to take part in out-of-home consumption. And therefore, there has been a lot of emphasis on cooking, baking and snacking at home with obviously, we've had to address in terms of the way in which we schedule and produce products in terms of flour and yeast and things that have gone out massively up 1000% over the last few months. Obviously, the hygiene and immunity is a huge focus for customers and it's amplified both in our stores and in people's homes, and we've been a big support to that. And you can also -- you see in the fact that contactors payments and using phones rather than touching other equipment, they are not -- that's not theirs. And therefore, this whole focus on hygiene and sanitization has been, I think, a very productive progression with or without COVID, and I'm sure it would continue post-COVID. And you've seen a rapid rise of online retail which is to be expected, and I'm delighted that we've managed to help with that. I thought rather than try and give you -- next slide, please. Rather than give you a detailed -- because as you'll appreciate, this is not our results. This is an update on our last year results, and I'm trying to give you a flavor and a color for where we are 5 periods into our first half. I can't actually give you the details and I know some of you, especially people like Shane and those from the question would want because we're not in a position to do a full trading update. We have issued to the market this morning an earnings update, and I'm going to go through that shortly, but we can't go into the level of detail that you'd like. But I thought this would be useful. So if you look at the top-left chart, which is essential goods. So that's our tin and packet groceries and the basics of life. You can see the spike in terms of panic buying. You can see the drop-off. And you can see the steadiness of that area, and it's slightly higher than before COVID and that results in this feeling that we've got a very strong underlying grocery and grocery business, which are the basics of what people absolutely need and to keep them going through these times. By contrast, if you look at the liquor and tobacco, you can see far more dramatic. You've seen a spike of people buying in between the 15th and the 26th of March when we lockdown, then there was nothing. And then the unlock of liquor, and then you can see the lockdown of liquor. So that's fairly dramatic, and it's pretty binary as well. On GMD, you saw a very marked reduction, very little panic buying. And then as we've reopened our general merchandise business, you've seen a steady return. And a roughly similar situation in clothing. Obviously, we don't carry the breadth of range that many of the leading clothing market leaders carry. But we've got a very strong and important business, and actually, our sort of casual great value clothings proved to be a bit of a hit so as we opened up our clothing businesses responded. But there are disruptions within that because obviously, the supply chain is fairly long. The impact of winter and summer and sales and the like is what everyone's dealing with. But it's good to see that customers will retain their enthusiasm for the clothing offer that we have. Next slide. Grocery home shopping has developed. I mean we are the largest grocery home shopping operator in the country. And you can see from the numbers, 240,000 new customers register online, that's 9 or 10x what we would normally expect in a year. 240,000 increasing active transacting customers, 700% growth in first-time customers. And overall turnover up over 100%. I mean, obviously, we've done a great job to increase our capacity at very short notice. But there's more capacity -- there's more demand quite often than there's capacity, but we believe that we've got a very good offer. Respectively, anything from full service, i.e., your whole shop delivered in a van to an on-demand app, which will deliver you relatively modest part size baskets direct to your home within 1 hour or 2 lead time. And then Click n Collect, if you just want the convenience of picking it up at the store but not actually havening gone shopping. And some of our entrepreneurial franchisees introduced drive-through. So a lot of innovation, creativity using technology, and that's been good to see and customers have appreciated what we've done for them. Next slide. So in terms of the earnings update that we issued at 8:00 this morning, I'd just like to identify that I believe that the company underlying, as the Chairman said, is actually in good shape. The basic operations of our business are actually working well. And I'm seeing very good control of costs and cash as we've been progressing over the last 4.5 months. The 3 weeks just before lockdown is when we started our financial year. So full 5.5 months of our 6 months of financial year will be with the impact of COVID. And there's 3 main areas which will significantly impact our half year results. Firstly, the trading restrictions due to government regulations designed to slow the spread of the virus. And I've just been through that and talked a little bit about that. The increased costs that we've incurred as a result of COVID, be it whether it's masks or sanitation or sanitizing stores or whether it's bonuses for our front-line staff, there's been a degree of cost, which is inevitable in our process. And then the third one is a one-stop cost to the group's voluntary severance program, and the cost of that program will be met fully in the first half, but it will be normalized by the end of financial year. So as a result, we issued a notice this morning saying that our headlines earnings per share for the 26 weeks to the 30th of August will be down more than 50% year-on-year. And -- but I would also remind you that normally, in our financial year, our first half accounts for about 1/3 of our profits, 2/3 in the second half. And this is an earnings update for the first half and not for the full year. Sadly, I'm not able to give you a level of detail, I think, as I said to you, some of you would require. But it will be possible, obviously, when we get to our half year results, when we can disclose the full process. What I can do is just to give you an indication of the trading restrictions again. We were prohibited in terms of the high-margin categories, liquor, tobacco, clothing, general merchandise, which is repeated in my earlier slide. Those restrictions eased in level 4 and 3, but tobacco remained. You'll be reminded that the ban on liquor was reinstated and is currently in place on the 12th of July. So nearly another month of ban on liquor sales. And also because we want to make sure that everyone's safe, any indication of a positive testing, whether the person was in or not in the store, we would shut the store and fully sanitize the store. And therefore, there has been disruption in terms of store closures, both for ourselves and for others in the marketplace. And also we have got to ensure good social distancing, we have to restrict the number of customers in the store, which is particularly challenging, especially over the SASSA payment days and especially in our Boxer business. Next slide. Again, I'll just repeat that we've taken necessary measures to keep the stores open and safe, and these things actually don't come for free. We put Perspex screens into the top points to protect both our customers and our cashiers. And we paid them ZAR 1,000 per colleague in April and May as an appreciation bonus, which was well received. And then finally, next slide. We had always planned in fairness to launch as part of Project Future, a group-wide voluntary severance program, and that was launched in March 2020. Like all things, we always have to improve the efficiency and productivity of any business at any time in its growth trajectory. I'm proud that we've done a job of that over the last 7 years. I feel that it's even more necessary for us to be efficient and effective because people need value today more than they've ever needed it before. And the participation of this program was entirely voluntary for colleagues. The 1,400 colleagues have left voluntarily, and we wish them well. And the program is expected to be cost-neutral in full year '21, i.e., in the full financial year that we're now in. And in subsequent years, the program will have a positive impact on the group's operating costs. And I think that it makes us a more sustainable and more effective in the year ahead and the years ahead. So that's a very brief summary of the performance of the business. Next slide. Now without being too depressing, I mean the economy wasn't that great before COVID. And let's be honest, it's not going to be great after COVID or as a consequence of COVID. We are experiencing low GDP growth. I mean, the different people speculate, but I think in our -- what I call our financial year the latest number that we've been indicated from the various people who monitor it is somewhere between minus 8%, minus 9%, minus 10%. There's a big spread on it. So you have to pick a number. The rand clearly is relatively weak against some of the other international currencies. And people are predicting a fairly severe downturn, both domestically and internationally as it goes with a GDP contraction as low as well -- as low as anyone who's alive can remember it, I think that would be fair. The question mark is how much does it improve after the sharp retraction. Be our survey says the business confidence is the lowest in 15 years and no big surprise there. And high unemployment and income inequality is obviously a real challenge in society anyway, but that is worsened because of the situation with COVID. But -- next slide, we feel like we have the right plan for these tough times. And the changes that we've been making since the start of our financial year, I think are putting us in a good space. We are reducing our costs. We've improved our flexibility and efficiency. I mean even this AGM has improved our effectiveness and efficiency. So not that we'd have chosen this way of presenting, but I think it's very effective and efficient. We've simplified, and we've got a more robust supply chain, simpler effective organization and the broader use of technology. 1,850 people who were working in our offices were working at their homes within the space of 2 weeks. And therefore, I applaud the performance of my IT team and also the ability to actually make sure that this business as usual in an environment that is definitely unusual. We know that we have to be keen on price and our promotions. I think our ranges have to be tighter, and I know our suppliers are finding that they need to be tied to if they want to stay in stock in these difficult times. We are using more personalized discounts. Private label is becoming even more important as people seek to have good quality at low prices. And despite the pandemic, we are continuing to open stores and refit stores so that we are fit for the future. So my penultimate slide is that the sign of a good plan is that when things get difficult, do you drop it or you just do it faster? And the answer is we're doing it faster. We've got a 6-point plan, it served us well for the last 7 years, and I think it will serve us well going forward. Lower prices, better value from Pick n Pay. Our Boxer business is in root health and performing extremely well, and Africa's favorite discounter, and there's certain more communities. We put in this thing bearing down on cost 2 years ago, and it's ever more relevant today. It's very difficult to do. Tough decisions have to be made, but I think it's the best for everybody who is in our company and everybody who own shares in our company, and I think we're making good progress on our Project Future, which is to take ZAR 1 billion out of our cost base. Value-added services, you've seen the continued the growth of our online business. I'm also pleased to announce that TimeBank, our partner in financial services is just announced that they've got 2 million customers, which is great news. Growth outside of Africa is tough and challenging, but the teams are doing a good job there. And in local currency, in the local market, I couldn't be more proud. Clearly, the impact on exchange rates, especially where there's dollar-based leases outside of South Africa has proved to be very challenging. But I believe that we do have a future there. We've never gone as fast as some others. So we don't have to pull out of places as quickly as some people might want to do. But I believe that we have a future in Africa, and I'm proud of what they're doing. And finally, the force is for good. You get to find out who the good guys are when it gets really tough because usually, they stopped doing all of the things that actually were good, but they were for the communities or they were for people who are less fortunate in life and in fairness, the thing that has always been the reason that I was a Pick n Pay much of the reason that I decided to stay on for another year is that doing good is good business. So just the final slide. So despite crisis, and you heard much of this from the Chairman, so I'm not going to over repeat it, is that this [indiscernible] times, you'll find that we want to put efforts, money and time into these areas. We've committed to reducing food waste. We have been recognized by the Carbon Disclosure Program as being a top-performing South African retailer in their last year's assessment. We're founding members of the African Plastic Pact, and we are reducing the amount of plastic. You've seen that from the comments that Chairman has made. Private label products are compliant. We're reducing salt and sugar from our products and making sure that they are still enjoyable and edible, but they're healthier for you. We launched 600 new healthy lines to help people live healthier lives. And the one that I'm certainly the most proud of is that we created over the last 7 years, more than 20,000 jobs directly, and I suspect a good deal more than that indirectly in our supplier base in our building program, and investing over ZAR 10 billion, I think, has put us in a good place. So yes, interesting times. I think that everyone is doing a good job, and I'm proud of them. It will result in an impact on our half year results. But the underlying performance of the business, I think, is in good health and I look forward to being able to explain that in more detail to you when we actually have finished the finance half, and I'm at liberty to disclose the details behind it. So that's my just short run-through of the performance and position of the company. And I think the agenda says I'm now handing over to Suzanne Ackerman, who's going to give you an update on our Feed the Nation program to close this AGM. Thank you.

Thank you, Richard. Good morning, everybody, and thank you for joining us. It's, as everybody knows, extraordinary times. But what I would like to share with you is how the Feed the Nation campaign has been the most extraordinary experience for every single one of our Pick n Pay store employees. It's the single longest-running campaign, as the Chairman mentioned, in the history of the company that engages all our stakeholders. And it reaches the entire Pick n Pay footprint, including Boxer, including our supplier base, and of course, most importantly, our customers and those communities. So I'd like to just start with a very, very short, half a second, couple of second clicks because this movie, this campaign talks directly to our core values. Those being business efficiency, consumer solvency, and the whole concept that was founded by my father, my parents that doing good is good business. We are definitely part of the communities we serve. And the integrity of the brand over many decades has helped us in this period gain integrity with -- sorry, gain a wide reach with our suppliers. This all started way back in February when we realized that we were all going to have to wash our hands. We reached out to the Williston Group, amazing suppliers for many, many years. They donated us couple of bars of soap. To be exact, it was 752,000 bars of soaps, which we started allocating out to the children within our Schools Club program. We have over 3,500 schools registered with us and have a reach of over 4 million children and families. So we thought we could start by giving up soap and then lockdown came. Can we have the next slide, please? With the lockdown, we suddenly realize that the children in the Schools Club and the schools feeding programs were not going to be getting the daily meal. So we started a small campaign as the Chairman mentioned, and Richard alluded to, which was just the family, the company and some of the executives getting together to try and feed and address the food crisis at the very beginning of lockdown with our Schools Club program. We had no idea that it was going to grow to the scale in which it has. We had to bring on partners, beneficiaries, and we selected JAM, the Joint Aid Mission (sic) [ Management ], Afrika Tikkun and SA Harvest, who together are feeding 1 million people on a weekly basis. They reach out to communities directly to homeless shelters within the Grand Central cities of South Africa. We utilize the resources of our transport partners. You can see on the slide, Coca-Cola, Unitrans and DHL. And in this figure here, we managed to partner with Afrika Tikkun who purchased 26 thousand hampers for us. For that purpose, we had to take over an aeroplane hangover, as you can see and pack the hampers. Each hamper, I'll show you a little bit later, has been a substantial amount of food to feed 1 family for a very long time, sometimes, in many cases, the food can last up to a month. We had very large funders, as you can see from the slide, the Kolisi Foundation, Investec, Absa, Courage is the community of Hathway who got together themselves and said they would like to purchase hampers from Pick n Pay through us. And again, it's because of the trust that our community and our funders have in the brand that has facilitated the scale with which this campaign has grown. Next slide, please. So I can very proudly say, as the Chairman mentioned, our total reach has been in excess of ZAR 67 million. And how we break that down is donations that have come directly from foundations, international foundations, ex South Africans who've been living abroad and seeing the scale of destitution and devastation that's happening, saying can we facilitate, can we help. And also, we've managed very quickly to create a web -- a digital voucher solution and huge credit must go to our digital team, our IS team and our partners with web tickets for creating this incredible service, which has provided over ZAR 33 million worth of vouchers, which have been sent directly to individuals through their cell phone. They walk into a store, and they can utilize the funds on their cell phone. The amazing thing is that customers at the toll points have donated to the campaign by adding at least ZAR 21, many have added ZAR 0.50, ZAR 1, whatever they could afford at the end of their shopping, and that will still be running, continuously running. That figure is amounted to ZAR 2.7 million. The Mandela Day campaign this year was run extremely successfully. And we managed to get some substantial match funding from Coca-Cola and Absa, and we're able to distribute ZAR 750,000 worth spent indirectly into hampers, which are going to vulnerable children within our Schools Club program. The customer total of that was ZAR 109,000 in 1 day raised at the toll points. Now what does this translate to in meals? As Richard and Gareth has mentioned, it's about 16.5 million meals. Directly, we've been responsible for 4.6 million meals. And indirectly, what we mean here is collections at trolleys at the toll, at the front of every single store around the country. We've engaged over 741 of our supermarkets. Every one of our stores is participating in this campaign. Our Boxer chain has been quite phenomenal. In fact, every -- the frontline staff in both Pick n Pay and Boxer have been quite extraordinary. And this little block in the right-hand corner here, all 194 of their stores have been committed to making up to hampers. And the turnaround time for the Boxer people has been unbelievable. They've managed to get together to source to pack and distribute 9,730 hampers, each hamper weighing about 30 kilograms, between 20 and 30 kilograms in 3 days, in 2 regions. Each hamper, as I said, ranges from between ZAR 200 to ZAR 800. And we've managed to reach up to 27,000 of the students and the children within our School Club program. There is still a very long way to go. Now have the next slide, please. So I just wanted to share with you how this campaign has touched every aspect of the Pick n Pay business. From the buyers in the support office, sourcing, procuring and negotiating the correct pricing from our suppliers, getting some of our major suppliers on board with us to provide some of the material, the digital vouchers we will then process all the funding directly into the web product into the warehouse. If it's in the store base, we will source goods right in the store and utilize our very owned staff in-store. And don't forget that for many, many weeks, we had level 5 lockdown, which meant that parts of our stores, particularly our hypermarkets, were not a large trade. So we had vacant aisles, which was the perfect area for many of our staff to just go and pack hampers. So we have these amazing photographs of the aisles of our hypermarket stores being filled with hampers, 2,000, 3,000 hampers a day being produced in these -- in our hypermarket facilities with the staff. We will then handle the distribution and directly into the communities. We do not engage with any external parties only with communities, with community leaders, with churches, mosques, welfare organizations that we are aware of that our communities that our staff within our store base understand and know. Next slide, please. This just shows you the national footprint that we've managed to reach, and I'm very proud of the work that every single one of our stores, every one of our formats, our franchisees have been extraordinary. And to me, it just brings home the value system that this company was founded on, being part of the communities we serve. And the franchisees in extreme areas, very far outlying areas, as you can see by the map, have not even been asked to do this. They have voluntarily given out their own funds, in many cases, ZAR 0.5 million up in the goods freight area has been given to the communities in that particular area by our franchisees. In Upington, in the Northern Cape, in the Marmaray community, wherever we look around the country where there is a Pick n Pay or a Boxer store, a franchise, a market store, the owners, the managers, the communities have been engaging and doing work with their communities. Next store, please -- I mean next slide. This is amazing. These are bags, which have been mentioned by Richard in his presentation are made by recycled Sprite bottles. No one really likes the color green [indiscernible] recycled. And we're very proud to say that this campaign alone has used over 250,000 of these bags, which has taken 500,000 little Sprite bottles out of our oceans and out of the environment. This is also something we started as was in the sustainability report. 2 years ago, we were looking at this particular bag. It is the cheapest bag on the market at ZAR 4, and it's provided the perfect vehicle or being the perfect opportunity for us to utilize for our hampers. Next slide, please. I just want to show you a couple of the impact photographs. And as you can see, the scale is enormous. And the hampers, the size of the hampers that we have been able to put together are really meaningful. Next slide, please. Every toll point has got point-of-sale material, and our staff have been asked and engaged to ask customers to donate to the Feed the Nation program at the toll point. And because of the reach and what we've managed to achieve here, we're very proud to say we've managed to register a foundation, a nonprofit organization, that will actually look into the future. Next slide, please, of recognizing how we have a responsibility to feed the nation, as Richard has said, and working with the foundation to ensure sustainable access to food security and food sources going forward for all our communities. As we know, transport is a massive problem within our country. And in many regions, people were bringing real bags to fill them up and to carry the goods home. This just shows the scale of the devastation that we have found in the communities outside of South Africa and around the stores that we have served. Next store, please -- next slide. We've engaged with -- directly with food and feeding kitchens. And what you can see in the bottom left-hand corner to me just symbolizes the devastating shock that the COVID virus has had on our communities. That is an old-age home. And I do question ourselves as communities, as society, the way we are caring for our elderly, our vulnerable children and the women in crisis in this country. And a campaign like this has really struck home to us the major issues that our society is facing, that we, as Pick n Pay, are supporting in any way possible. Next slide, please. In some cases, our staff themselves have been getting together and we saw previously the Langeberg, the staff, the merchandisers and some of the trolley porters put funds in themselves to actually help reach out to their communities because they've felt in the Langenberg area, the crisis was so enormous. Through our brands, we have managed to secure the support of some major rugby players, as you can see in the picture. And as I'd like to say to my team, if you want to do a great campaign, get 2 fantastic rugby players on your side, put 1 in each pocket and away you go, and it has been extraordinary. And huge thank you to Siya Kolisi, his wife Rachel and their foundation and to Bryan Habana and his foundation, who collectively have given us nearly ZAR 4 million towards this campaign and feeding children in the Schools Club programs. Next slide, please. [Presentation]

Thank you. Thank you, Richard and Gareth.

Yes, thank you Suzanne and to Richard, both excellent presentations, and you can see the huge amount of work that Pick n Pay is doing to live the 3 core values that we have in the business. One is to make sure we look after our customers. Customer is queen, and to make sure we look after society, through doing good is good business, and to make sure that we can run the most efficient business that we possibly can. So I thank you for all your support as shareholders and friends for what we do as a company, it's really most appreciated.

Now if we can just move to -- back to the questions. We have a few questions that we need to answer. Okay. Richard, if you could please answer these 2 questions from Shane Watkins.

Yes, Shane. We can't give you the exact number for the rand cost of the voluntary segment because it's just being completed. But you'll remember that we did a similar exercise, I think, 3 years ago. So it will be less than that number, which, from memory, was around about ZAR 200 million. But we don't have a specific number that I can give you because it's still in the process of being a bit of people actually taking up the package. So -- but as you can see, we're 1,400 people, it's a reasonable sum. The second one, which is -- yes, we will to be honest. We never canceled it. We deferred it. I think the various legal terminology for the JSE, so I have to make sure I don't step on the landmine. But we have the money. It's safe. It's doing a good job. And we just need to make sure that the criteria we'll be discussing at our Board meeting after this. And what we would plan to do is to come back in at the end of the first half in October and update the market.

Thank you. Are there any other questions? Okay. If not, I have the results in -- from the voting on the resolutions. And every single resolution passed with the required number of votes. Yesterday, when we were looking at the proxy voting, it indicated that our rem resolutions may not pass. However, under final voting, all the resolutions have passed. We here acknowledge all the rem concerns raised, particularly in the questions this morning. Our disclosures have improved over time, but clearly, we need to do more. Penny Gerber, our Head of in Investor Relations, will reach out to the shareholders who've indicated concerns and engage fully on these important issues. So we're not going to switch those questions you put up earlier under the carpet. We're going to engage with [indiscernible] and [indiscernible] and any others directly and answer your questions. And anybody who has any queries on this one, please do contact Penny Gerber, and she will make sure that we answer all the questions correctly. And just checking I've got everything correct. As there's no further business in this AGM, I'd formally like to close the proceedings of the 52nd AGM of Pick n Pay Stores Limited and I particularly would like to thank you all for your attendance. The results will be posted and they are busy putting them up on my screen at the moment. So presumably, you can see them as well. But we will be putting them up on our Investor Relations website as soon as we can in the very near future. So thank you very much, everybody, for attending. And lots of good luck for the rest of the year and hope we will get through COVID and move on to having a much better and stronger society and country. Thank you very much.