Citadel Capital, a leading investment company in the Middle East and Africa, has appointed Ahmed El Rashidi to head a portfolio of food processing companies.

The group includes leading Egyptian confectioner Rashidi El-Mizan, juice and diary producer Enjoy, cheese manufacturer El Misrieen and Sudanese confectioner El Musharaf.

The move follows the operational milestones achieved by core agrifoods platform company Gozour, which includes milk production at Dina Farms and a management restructuring that will maximise synergies for its food processing group.

Dina Farms, a leading dairy producer in Egypt, continues to achieve record raw milk production of more than 200 tonnes per day. Milk production is expected to peak at 230 tonnes per day in March.

Hanee Afia, CEO of Dina Farms Group, said: “The increase in herd size is a part of a comprehensive dairy expansion programme that includes the addition of international-standard milking stations that will see us increase our overall raw milk production to 72,000 tonnes per annum in 2014 from the 60,000 tonnes per annum that the farm produced last year.”

“We expect to grow our sales by more than 20 per cent in 2014, with a total retail market share north of 65 per cent in the fresh bottled milk category,” said Afia.

Citadel Capital has an effective ownership stake of 43.25 per cent in Gozour. Agrifoods is one of five core industries in which the company invests alongside energy, transportation, mining and cement. - TradeArabia News Service