The agro-export company announced that it will lay off around 8,000 employees globally. In Argentina it has already made progress with more than 600 dismissals, mainly hierarchical personnel.
The sharp drop in international prices of agricultural commodities is hitting the main grain trading companies in the world. In this context, the multinational Cargill reported a drastic decision: it will lay off 5% of its global workforce, which translates into around 8,000 people, out of a total of 164,000.. A no small fact is that South America represents 21% of its workforce and that is why a strong impact is expected in Argentina. Even at this time the first dismissal telegrams would be arriving.
“To strengthen Cargill’s impact, we must realign our talent and resources to be in line with our strategy,” the company said in a statement. “Unfortunately, that means reducing our global workforce by approximately 5%. This difficult decision was not made lightly. “We will lean on our core value of putting people first as we support our colleagues during this transition.”
Although the firm is not public information, since it is not listed on the Stock Exchange, so it does not report its financial results, it was learned that for its fiscal year ended last May it recorded US$160,000 million in sales, almost a 10 % less than the US$177 billion in fiscal year 2023.
In Argentina, Cargill has a strong presence in the agribusiness business and a giant structure. It has more than 3,300 employees, operates in eight provinces, has more than 50 storage plants, has five port terminals (one in Bahía Blanca, Buenos Aires, another in Diamante, Entre Ríos and three in Santa Fe, Puerto San Martín, Villa Gobernador Gálvez and Punta Alvear), processes grains in two plants located in Santa Fe (San Martín and Villa Gobernador Gálvez), has a corn wet milling plant in Villa Mercedes, San Luis and an animal nutrition plant in Venado Tuerto, Santa Fe. In turn, in the ranking of grain and by-product exporting companies in Argentina, the company placed second with just over 8.14 million tons, behind Viterra which held 11.34 million tons.
Although the company chooses not to comment on a possible adjustment in its local operations, the truth is that the dismissal telegrams have already begun to arrive not only among operators, but also among hierarchical personnel of the firm.
According to the Association of Supervisors of the Biodiesel Industry of the Argentine Republic (Asiabra), some 600 hierarchical staff workers (outside the agreement) in charge, managers, supervisors and administrative staff were laid off in the country between Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. For their part, there are around 70 layoffs among the workers, including their various grain processing and reception plants.
The truth is that in the agro-industrial sector, for months there has been talk that agro-export companies are not showing their best results in the face of a business that has shrunk significantly. In this framework, there is speculation about the possibility of Cargill gradually moving forward with more layoffs among its Argentine workforce because it also has a giant structure.
For now, the Asiabra union has already made a presentation to the provincial labor portfolio and is expected to schedule a hearing between the company and worker representatives next Monday.
Source: Ambito
