Cargills (Ceylon) PLC, a leading Retail and FMCG company in the country, had the distinction of being listed in the Top 10 Most Admired Companies for the 2019/20 financial year. This recognition was awarded by the International Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka (ICCSL), the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and the Daily FT. This accolade is a testament to our long-standing commitment to creating sustainable value for all our stakeholders.
Backed by a 175-year legacy in Sri Lanka
From serving a few to serving many, Cargills has been through a journey from being a primarily wholesale and retail business to a diversified company with a presence across the country and is also a large contributor to the local food manufacturing sector.
A presence across the length and breadth of the country
Our retail arm, Cargills FoodCity is the most widespread retail chain with outlets in all 25 districts in the country. By expanding into new regions, we create new markets for our farmers and entrepreneurs and also provide employment opportunities to the youth.
Embracing innovation is at the core of our business model and this is evident in many new ventures such as Asia’s first mobile supermarket, Cargills 2 Home and Cargills Online, the country’s first end-to-end online grocer.
Venturing into new sectors
Over the last 20 years, we have ventured into the food manufacturing business and have built brands and elevated them to new heights. To strengthen the country’s food industry and provide our customers with nutritious food on a daily basis, many investments have been made towards building several state-of-the-art manufacturing and processing facilities.
We also look for ways to improve domestic production and are always engaging with more farmers since most of our raw materials are sourced locally. Furthermore, in our efforts in enhancing local markets, we also help ease the country’s foreign exchange pressures thereby complementing Sri Lanka’s endeavors to reduce import costs.
Our contribution towards the farming communities
Our work with our farmers is the heart of our socio-centric business model. We strive to empower the farming community in more ways than by sustaining their livelihoods. Through our Sarubima Fund, we give back to our farmers by offering their youth, educational scholarships and initiating many community development projects in the rural areas. Moreover, we bring in the youth and give them career opportunities through our independent educational institute, the Albert A. Page Institute (AAPI).
We actively engage with our farmers in order to improve their productivity and yields for them to be entrepreneurs in their own right, aka “gentleman farmers”. We provide them with extension services, technical input, guidance on best practices (such as Good Agricultural Practices/GAP) to improve their access to the market. Moreover, we have taken our farmers on overseas visits and introduced them to modern farming techniques which enabled them to build their own model farms.
Strengthening domestic dairy production
We have transitioned to be a major contributor to the Sri Lankan dairy industry and extend our fullest support towards improving domestic milk production. With our end-to-end dairy value chain proposition which includes Sri Lanka’s first fully integrated dairy processing plant, we have a strong commitment towards enhancing the productivity of our dairy farmers and actively encourage the consumption of fresh dairy as a life style.
Grateful for the support
We are humbled by this recognition, the credit of which goes to each and every team member of our Cargills family and we would like to thank the awarding bodies for this honour.
We have immense trust in our team who has rallied around the vision of Cargills, which is to serve the needs of the community at large. They are our heroes and we are grateful that they have placed their confidence in us as they understand that whatever their individual contribution is, it is for the betterment of the country.