ARGENTINA
Finlay Buys Argentine Firm
UK tea company Finlays, which grows tea in Kenya and Sri Lanka, bought Casa Fuentes SACIFI, Argentina’s largest tea estate company based in the Province of Misiones, which has an annual production capacity of 27 million kg. The company grows tea on 2,000 hectares and operates five factories where they process, grade, blend, and pack black tea for export to North America. Casa Fuentes tea is all Rainforest Alliance certified, pesticide-free, and particularly well suited to the production of tea extracts for the ready-to-drink sector in the US. Finlay’s group managing director Ron Mathison said “Finlays is already a market leader in the delivery of tea and coffee extract solutions to the food and beverage business sector in the US.
This acquisition will not only provide assurance of supply of suitable raw material, it will provide Finlays with a platform for research and development, new product development, and innovation in delivering custom specific tea blends.”