From the Ground Up - McCain Foods Limited

Management, McCain South
Africa, 2006.
Front row: (left to right)
Gavin Naisby, Owen Porteus,
Anthony Cripwell, Heather
Partner.
Back row: S.J. de Klerk , Dan
Leger, Ron Mander, Bert
Weenink, Tim Hedges.
An important contributor to McCain’s efforts to obtain good raw materials from
South African farms was Andy Goodwin, who first travelled through the country in
1996 when McCain was searching for the best potato-growing areas. He moved to
South Africa from Britain with his wife and two young children in 1997 to become
chief agronomist. He played an important role in selecting the processing varieties
best suited to South African conditions and worked with growers to teach them how
best to grow those varieties. Goodwin became agriculture director for South Africa
before returning to the United Kingdom in 2006 to become director of corporate
agriculture in charge of strategic initiatives.
McCain South Africa exports to other African countries, usually in the wake of
local retailers expanding there. It’s not easy, as the logistics are challenging. Shipping
companies and customers don’t always understand that frozen food has to stay frozen.
The result is sometimes what Porteus calls “thermally abused” product that has
been left on a dock in the hot sun, rendering it inedible.
Sub-Saharan Africa has 650 million people, a potential market too large for
McCain to ignore. The solid base it has built in South Africa will help it penetrate
more of that market if and when more African countries enjoy political stability and
economic development. It may take years until the rest of Africa is ready for McCain.
What’s certain is that McCain will be ready for Africa.
The “drink the local wine” philosophy is fundamental
to the worldwide success of McCain
Foods. George McClure explains it this way: “We
didn’t have an ego when we went into a country.
Whether it was Great Britain, the Netherlands,
or South America, we didn’t go in with the attitude,
‘Well, we know more about growing potatoes,
we know more about processing potatoes
then anybody else.” We went in and said, ‘Let’s
just watch and learn and see what they’re doing.’
So we watched them grow the potatoes and we
watched them process them and we then said,
‘Well, here is an area where we can make some
improvements.’ We went in with an open mind,
and I think that’s primarily what Harrison and Wallace meant when they spoke about
drinking the local wine.”
“To drink the local wine literally was not hard in Argentina,” says Ghislain Pelletier,
who went there in 1992 to help McCain establish a potato-processing business in
South America. “And the people were warm and welcoming. It was an opportunity
to learn about another culture and another language. My wife and I and our two kids
have become fluent in Spanish.”
Pelletier, a native of Grand Falls, New Brunswick, worked for that province’s agriculture
department as a potato specialist before accepting a two-year posting to Jordan
for a seed potato project sponsored by the Canadian International Development
Agency. When the Gulf War broke out, the project was shelved. But Pelletier and
his wife, Suzanne, were determined to see the world before their two young children
went into school. Also, Pelletier knew there was plenty to learn about agriculture that
he couldn’t learn in New Brunswick. So he decided to explore the opportunities at
McCain Foods.
He went to see Wallace McCain, who told him that the company was eyeing three
regions for future growth: East Germany, New Zealand, and South America. Wallace
told Pelletier, “I am going to send you there, young guy. You are going to travel the
world. But first I am going to send you to Nebraska.”
McCain was considering setting up a factory in Nebraska, and it also had a study
in progress on growing potatoes under irrigation on four hundred hectares of farmland
it had rented. “You measure the water in the soil, and when the soil reaches a
196 From the GrouN d up
New w orlds to CoN quer 197
Traditional potato growing
in Argentina: rows of corn are
grown in between potatoes
so the stalks can be used at
harvest time to cover the
potatoes, which are stored
in the field in piles.