Hugh Friel was in at the ground floor and he tells Jane O'Sullivan, Markets Correspondent, he's not leaving any time soon.

Come April 1st, Mr Hugh Friel, managing director of Kerry Group, will have been 31 years with the company. Not surprisingly for a person who has spent such a long time with one firm, Mr Friel is a man who takes the long view.

"I am a great believer in measurement over time rather than taking a snapshot in any given month," he says, adding that his focus is always on the next five-year rolling period.

So what plans has Mr Friel for Kerry Group over the next five years? Having taken over the running of the company from Mr Denis Brosnan last January, Mr Friel shows little inclination to depart from the growth strategy that has served Kerry so well over the past three decades.

Under his stewardship, the company plans to continue the acquisition drive that has taken it from small regional creamery to multibillion euro corporation. Much of the focus will be on further expanding its ingredients and flavours divisions, the high-margin businesses that have allowed Kerry to maintain its track record of double-digit earnings growth in recent years.

"Our European and American operations now have operating profits of more than €100 million. We have two big businesses in America and Europe but we have got to build the southern American part of our American business and Asia Pacific."

He concedes, however, that opportunities in Asia are not as plentiful as in other parts of the world. The company's strategy in the past has been to start selling in an area and, over time, look for opportunities to acquire. Where they don't arise, it has then looked at building greenfield sites, a pattern it may adopt in Asia, where it is keen to penetrate markets like China, Japan and Korea.

Mr Friel also plans to expand the flavours business, making Kerry a top industry player. "We are in the UK, Italy, Australia, the US and Canada. We have geographic spread but not the scale I would like. It may take time but we will get there. We are always prepared to take the long view."

It's unlikely, however, that Mr Friel imagined, when he joined North Kerry Milk Products in 1972, that he would one day head a multinational business with operations on four continents.

Having worked for Mobil Oil in London and Erin Foods in the Republic, he answered an advertisement seeking a chief accountant at the small casein plant in Listowel.

Kerry's deputy managing director, Mr Denis Cregan, began as head of production on the same day. At the time, the company had just one employee, Mr Denis Brosnan, and was run from a caravan in Listowel as its plant was only partly constructed.

"Ten of us joined Denis that day. There was no room to meet in the caravan so we adjourned to the Listowel Arms Hotel for a brief introduction, then it was back to work and we've been working since," Mr Friel says.

"We were a bunch of young people with plenty of enthusiasm and what we lacked in experience we made up for in other qualities."

Recruiting highly motivated young people to its 18,500-strong workforce is something on which Mr Friel remains keen. He describes the company's graduate recruitment programme, which draws from colleges in 20 countries, as "one of my pet hobbies".

"We invest a lot of time in young people," he says, describing Kerry as a "very exciting organisation" with a "can-do culture".

As a result of the "talent" within the company, he has no concerns about who will take over at the helm when he and Mr Cregan, both in their late 50s, eventually follow Mr Brosnan into retirement.

"I will be here for quite a number of years," says the quietly spoken 58-year old, who originally hails from Fanad in Co Donegal. "But succession planning is no major problem from a Kerry point of view. There is a lot of talent through this organisation, a lot of capability," he says.

Once described as having a lower public profile than Howard Hughes, Mr Friel is known to have been a good youth soccer player and played minor Gaelic football for Donegal "a very long time ago". These days, however, he is more closely associated with the Kerry football team, which takes the field emblazoned with the Kerry Group logo. It is a relationship Mr Friel describes as "good for them and good for us".

A keen sailor in his spare time, he takes part in Cork Week and weekend regattas as well as sailing locally in Tralee.

Indeed, Kerry Group was among those involved in the rescue package for the Jeanie Johnston replica Famine ship, which last week set out on her maiden transatlantic voyage. "The project needed a little shove and a push. We helped take it across the starting line and now they're away," Mr Friel says.