Estonia, Foodstuff, Good for Business, Investments, Markets and Companies

The 8 million euro investment will go towards modernizing the unit's frying department, including the expansion of the building and the installation of new cooking and packaging lines enabling implementation of new technologies and packaging solutions, HKScan said. The new cooking lines will reduce the unit's energy consumption by 5%, while the carbon footprint will be further reduced by switching from electricity to gas.

"The market for fried products and minced-meat-based, ready-to-eat foods such as meatballs, nuggets and cutlets is growing fast. We want to further develop this attractive category and thereby secure HKScan's competitive edge within this segment. Our upcoming investment in state-of-the-art technologies will allow us to launch innovative new products and packaging solutions. At the same time it will boost our productivity, increase our capacity, and allow us to expand our export volumes on neighboring markets and even further away," Anne Mere, chairman of the management board of HKScan Estonia, said.

The group considers Estonia an important market and will constantly contribute to the local farms and production facilities. "The investment in our Rakvere unit demonstrates our ambition to strengthen our market leadership in Estonia and across the Baltics, which requires constant improvement of our local farms and production facilities as well as modernization of our ways of working," CEO of HKScan Jari Latvanen said.

HKScan Estonia is part of the Finnish HKScan Group, which operates in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and the Baltics and exports products to approximately 50 countries. HKScan's net revenue in 2016 was 1.9 billion euros and the group employed around 7,300 employees at the end of the year.