Through his foresight we there went in time

Which could revive the stock market with the first significant introduction of 2010 An ACE of the Internet A genius of the biotech Not the least of the world... Just 12,000 sugar beet growers of the Tereos sugar cooperative, whose assets "no sugar" will be soon quoted in Paris and Sao Paulo, under the banner Tereos Internacional (see box). A set of value originally estimated at 1.7 billion euros, just get the green light to buy quarter French and become the unique sugar from the island of Réunion.

Béghin-Say sugar packets to the partnership established early may with the oil giant Petrobras to develop biofuels, Tereos has gradually built an unknown empire for the general public. In twenty years, the modest coopérative de Picardie founded in Origny-Sainte-Geum, in the Aisne, multiplied by fifty production, to become the second European sugar group, the fourth to the Brazil, and a leader in the transformation of starch of wheat for food industry, paper and pharmaceutical. All without abandoning its cooperative status. A singular journey, in a landscape agricultural French characterized by the fall in the incomes of farmers.

Twenty-five years, the cooperative is driven by a Picard, simple, modest, but visionary and tactical. Aged sixty-four, Philippe Duval, Chairman of the Board, fell in the beet from childhood. His father John has dedicated his life to transform the small distillery of Origny-Sainte-Geum in a modern sugar factory. "Twenty-four years, I joined him and I have worked alongside her until he entrusted me the reins in 1984." "The plant was very powerful but had only 2 of the allowances French production of sugar, when Tereos holds a 45 today," he recalled.

"Growers shareholders."

Concentration, diversification and internationalization, Philippe Duval is never break, leading several acquisitions per year. As that of a new plant in Brazil, announced yesterday. To support farmers, he must defend the Cooperative Statute, which allows "operator to supplement his income by a margin issue of processing and distribution", explains. And to strive to do not depart from the golden rule enacted by his father: "A third of the margin is used to pay an additional price per tonne of beet delivered, second third to modernize the industrial tool and the third to diversify." Thus he established a relationship of trust and long term with "its growers shareholders", of which the shares in the cooperative are proportional to the quantity of beet delivered. Unlike shares, the shares in question do not value, and capital remains thus acquired to the candy, and profits. In Exchange, the planter was the guarantee of its production at a good price, and benefits from diversification from dividends. Provided the hands to the Pocket, when the candy is needed money to finance its external growth. A bet made in 2002, when the takeover of private Béghin-Say, the fact Philippe Duval, who thus hoisted its cooperative first in the French weapon of sugar. Growers had then borrowed more than a year of sales, in part as a renunciation to their complement of price. This close relationship with the operators "draws its roots in the 1930s, when our grandparents, faced with the crisis, decided to share a harvest year to finance their own sweets, to capture the added value and do not depend on industry", explains Thierry Lecomte, Chairman of the Board of supervision of Tereos and representative of the growers.

In addition, beet, protected for almost forty years of the competition by the European Union, has experienced a golden age for the constitution of pretty magots. "Our gross margin of self-financing was high," recognizes Thierry Lecomte, while rendering with Philippe Duval to the be well used. According to a simple tactic: attack first, wear the railway where the competition threat until it you stifle.

The bet of cereal starch

By observing that in the United States, most of the sugar market fails to glucose from corn, more suited to many agri-food products (sweetened drinks, ice, confectionery...), Philippe Duval thus persuaded beet growers to start sweetening products from the cereal starch production. A technical and gourmet trade in capital. To finance, "we naturally turned to grain cooperatives, since our beet growers also are in the majority of the grain", he says. "From 2001 to 2006, we invested heavily at the expense of profit," remembers Pierre - Christophe Duprat, the pattern of the grain industry, "but when presented the opportunity to buy five amidonneries to Tate & Lyle for EUR 308 million, grain co-ops immediately mobilized, providing half of the necessary funds." Tereos has thus created Syral, third European Emmer. Pierre-Christophe Duprat him also emphasizes stability and strength of a "peasant" share, more interested in the long term than immediate profits, under his inherent desire "to pass its operations to its children." Thanks to Syral, Tereos is only emanation of beet 12,000, but grain 50,000 representing one quarter of the French crop!

Cape on the Brazil

At the same time, Philippe Duval also observed the rise in power of sugar cane, more competitive from beet, especially because with the new techniques of cogeneration of electricity and heat from bagasse, sugarcane uses a "free" energy The conclusion: go to establish in the world's leading, the Brazil. "Through his foresight, we there went in time." "Today, there is more room for newcomers", said Thierry Lecomte. A partnership is established in 2000 with the Brazilian Cosan, which opens the doors of the small circle of the cane to French planters. At the redemption, two years later, Béghin-say, Philippe Duval benchmark thus immediately its nugget: the Guarani, near sugar factory in Sao Paulo. Tradition requires, it sends his son Alexis, released recently from HEC, to the conquest of this country from Cocagne, where it built 20 sweets per year, when Europe adds closures. "bizut" proven: introduced on the stock exchange in 2007, Guarani multiplies its production by three sugar and ethanol by five. Society has to build an alliance of 700 million euros with Petrobras, to stay ahead of the mad race to the Brazil for the global leadership of sugar, ethanol, and "bioenergy". A thirty-three years, Alexis, now Director of Tereos, financial and international to dream in "green" energy champion He is leading the entry into Fellowship of Tereos Internacional, fruit of the two major strategic decisions of his father: diversification towards sophisticated sweetening products and the Brazil.

Tereos was able to overcome the reform of 2006, when Brussels, tired of paying aid to the sugar sector, has decided to liberalize the market. Removing the export aid, lower customs duties, reduction of 30 of production quotas and prices guaranteed... The adjustment was brutal: 80 sugar mills have closed their doors in the Union and the less competitive growers have abandoned the production for compensation (one in five in France). Once in overproduction of 25 from its consumption, Europe became importing 20 of its needs. "The Brazilians have won the battle of sugar", concludes Philippe Duval, which can be to have been the only European sugar to turning to Latin America to become franco-brésilien. Ready to open new chapter that will carry it from food to energy, to meet the expected doubling of the consumption of biofuels by 2015. Philippe Duval, no doubt, Tereos can double the last five years and thus to bring its turnover of 3.6 to some 7 billion euros. Why so much appetite "To defend the colors of French agriculture, with these big global players that are Cargill and Bunge Dreyfus", slip the President, stressing that despite the introduction on the stock market, it is still, French farmers cooperative, which will keep the reins of development.