Food company Glanbia blamed tough conditions in the Irish food market for flat half-year profits and announced an acquisition in the US.
Glanbia said pretax profit for the first half of 2006 was €30.2 million on revenue of €922.8 million, a similar result to 2005. Operating profit fell 5 per cent to 36.4 million on account of one-off rationalisation costs.
"Undoubtedly these are challenging times for Irish Food Ingredients given the magnitude and timing of the impact of EU Mid Term Review (MTR) on dairy markets," said Glanbia's managing director John Moloney.
However, Mr Moloney pointed out that all other aspects of the group performed satisfactorily including a strong performance from the newly formed property unit.
Glanbia also announced the acquisition of US-based food supplement firm Seltzer for $105 million.
Looking ahead to the rest of the year, Glanbia said that as trading currently stands, it expects to meet market expectations for the full year and it remains on track to achieve double digit growth in 2007.