CALGARY – The controversial distribution of $5 million worth of shares in Fletcher’s Fine Foods has been settled by a producer vote.
In a mail-in plebiscite, pork producers voted to allocate 2.9 million shares in the Red Deer-based processing plant to a group of hog farmers known as the extra levy producers.
The additional shares were the result of a $5-million profit at Fletcher’s during its 1994 fiscal year.
About 42 percent of eligible voters cast ballots, said the Alberta marketing council, a government agency that oversees provincial commissions and marketing boards.
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Returned ballots showed 962 in favor of giving the shares to the extra levy producers. The remaining 888 voters favored giving them to producers who sold hogs in 1994.
Extra levy producers are those who paid $2 per hog marketed in the early 1980s so the Alberta Pork Producers Development Corporation board would have the cash to buy the company.
Distribution of the majority shares for producers who sold hogs in 1994 started in July. The shares are actively trading at $1.85 to $1.92, up from the original value of $1.71, said Gary Shaw, chair of the pork producers corporation.
After a plebiscite in 1992 ownership went to producers rather than the pork producers corporation. Eventually, VenCap Corp. injected about $10 million and some members of Fletcher’s management put in another $1 million.
