Golden Vale's milk processing operations in Charleville which it planned to sell to its milk suppliers will not be sold and are an integral part of the assets Kerry will take over, Kerry deputy managing director Mr Hugh Friel has stated.

Speaking to The Irish Times after the recommended offer was announced just two minutes before the markets closed last night, Mr Friel said: "Charleville is a very important part of the set-up for us."

He added that Kerry did not expect any difficulties in dealing with the milk suppliers who have been in open warfare with the Golden Vale management over the price of milk. "We have dealt with farmers of all sizes for many years. I don't believe we will have problems in dealing with the Golden Vale farmers. They are a very important part of the set-up because they supply the raw material."

He added that Kerry's decision to spend #250 million (£197 million) in beefing up its consumer foods business would not distract it from looking for major acquisitions in the international food ingredients operations that have been the driving force behind Kerry's growth in recent years.

Kerry is one of half a dozen ingredients companies of similar sizes, he said, adding: "We are as well-equipped as any of the others to make a big acquisition." Kerry has said in the past that it could handle an acquisition of up to $2 billion (#2.32 billion).

Mr Friel was emphatic that there were major synergies between the Kerry and Golden Vale business, and not just in the area of milk collection and processing. "Golden Vale has an excellent ready meals business in Ireland with two spanking new plants in Carrickmacross and Enniskillen. We are in ready meals in the UK.

"We are also adding cheese as a chilled consumer product, an area we weren't in before, and Golden Vale has been very successful in developing branded cheese products. But what we have is a distribution network which extends the length and breath of the UK and Ireland. Golden Vale has a significant sliced cheese plant in Coleraine, which supplies many of the same customers that we track all around the world. Those businesses are totally complementary," he added.

As well as pursuing its ambitions to become an even bigger player in food ingredients, Mr Friel indicated the group would also be looking for opportunities to expand the consumer foods business in the UK. "There has been a lot of acquisitions by financial buyers in recent years and those type of buyers tend to have a three- to five-year timeframe. So we will be very mindful of what's happening around us."

On the fall in the Kerry share price since the move for Golden Vale first became public two weeks ago, Mr Friel said: "The share has been weak because we have stayed out of institutional presentations. Now we will have an opportunity to tell institutions about this offer."