Farmers across Tayside and Fife have been left reeling by the collapse of a cooperative which stores and sells grain for 69 agriculture businesses across the region.
Angus Cereals Limited has gone into administration, just ahead of this year’s harvest.
The farmer-owned cooperative has a 40,000 tonne storage facility at Montrose Harbour, which cost £7 million to develop.
Administrators say they are hoping to secure a buyer for the assets by harvest time.
The bulk of the members are Angus farmers, but several are from Perthshire and at least one grower in Fife is affected.
Former director, David Fairlie from West Balmirmer, Arbroath said he believed work was in already progress to source a new partner .
“These are good facilities and hopefully by next week we will know more about an alternative operator,” he said.
Crieff farmer and Quality Meat Scotland chairman Jim Mclaren, another former director, said the administration was a result of “very unfortunate circumstances”.
Other farmers who did not want to be named said the business model hadn’t delivered what growers originally hoped it would do.
One producer said: “Farmers will lose some capital, but not a lot. Mainly they paid an annual charge to store and process the grain, so they paid for a service.
“We are optimistic that the facilities will still be available for 2018, but at the moment we don’t know under whose ownership that will be.”
The farmer owned cooperative was first operational for the 2011 harvest and substantial EU grants were received for the Montrose plant.
Iain Fraser and Tom MacLennan, partners at specialist business advisory firm FRP Advisory LLP, were appointed as joint administrators on Thursday.
Mr Fraser said: “Angus Cereals has played an important role for the agricultural community in the east of Scotland.
“Unfortunately, it has not been possible to secure the future viability of the business and the board has been left with no alternative but to appoint administrators.
“We are now actively seeking a buyer for the assets at Montrose and are hopeful that this can be secured in time for the 2018 harvest.”
Angus Cereals’ website states its aim is to “add value” to members’ businesses through “lower costs and effective marketing”.
It adds: “By working together and implementing the correct infrastructure, we can vastly reduce costs relating to rejections, double handling, haulage and drying.”
