The Almeria cooperatives Casur SCA and ParqueNat SCA have approved their merger into Natursur, SCA, a new cooperative society whose integration process will become effective as of 1 September. Both cooperatives share similarities such as crops, corporate structure and legal form, which has facilitated this operation.
The aim of the merger is "to maintain the improvement in farmers' profitability sustained over time and to achieve greater organisational efficiency and management capacity", said José Martínez Portero, President of Casur. The aim is also "to specialise in work centres by reserving one of them for organic cultivation, as Casur has been doing until now, in its Viator facilities, and reserving the Níjar de ParqueNat warehouse for conventional crops", according to the president of this cooperative, José Ángel González.
The entity resulting from the merger guarantees employment for 100% of the staff of both cooperatives. It will have more than 600 hectares belonging to its 300 members, which will place it in a production volume of around 75,000 tonnes, with an average employment of 600 people and a turnover of around 80 million euros.
Natursur, the company resulting from the merger of Casur and ParqueNat, forms part of Unica, an association made up of a dozen cooperatives, most of which are from Almeria, although there are also cooperatives from other provinces such as Cadiz, Granada and Murcia. Unica already has a joint marketing experience of up to a decade with a volume of 375 million kilos of fruit and vegetables sold.
Casur, the cooperative presided by José Martínez Portero, is integrated into the Navarrese agri-food giant AN.
Source: lavozdealmeria.com
