Food Processing

Agriculture, food and retail will be top priorities for the Sino-Russian vehicle, which will also target mining and infrastructure investments.

The fund, which has raised NZ$32m to date, will target agtech, agribusiness and food, but not farmland, according to Oriens Capital chief executive James Beale.

Australian impact investment firm Blue River has carved out agribusinesses as one of eight areas it believes its investments can have positive social impact.

Following this month’s Carlton Hill station deal, the two companies are looking at further feedlotting and finishing beef investments in the region.

The funding will help expand sales of its healthier frozen poultry meals to large retailers, including Target and Kroger.

The Chinese state-owned company plans to merge its subsidiaries into a global agri platform, the latest move in a wave of global agri corporate consolidation.

The facility will be incorporated into Forage Global, a new subsidiary looking to follow the global trend of aggressive consolidation and vertical integration in the forage industry.

The commitment to the food processing and marketing-focused fund follows a $100m investment from Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Management Board.

Apollo is still building on its platform Pinnacle, which acquires and scales up agri inputs businesses, but will look opportunistically at other agribusiness assets with its latest fund.

The decision to appoint Stephen Thompson chief investment officer is a sign that the company will quickly build up its retail and downstream capacity.