Asset AllocationAugust 4, 2014

Wellcome Trust Digs Deep for Co-op’s Agribusiness

The UK’s largest endowment has boosted its farming business with a £249 million purchase.

Reported by Featured Author

The Wellcome Trust has upped its long-term agricultural holdings with the purchase of a farming business, worth £249 million, from the UK’s ailing Co-operative Group

Though purchasing Farmcare Trading Ltd the £16.5 billion endowment—the UK’s largest—will increase its agricultural capacity by 15 farms, 100 residential properties, and 27 commercial properties, it announced today.

It already has agribusinesses based in England and alongside these rural holdings the trust owns prime real estate in London’s South Kensington, creating a portfolio valued at £1.8 billion.

“The trust’s philosophy is to provide long-term investment for the businesses and property we hold, in good times and in bad,” said Wellcome Trust CIO Danny Truell. “We will take this approach to running Farmcare Trading Ltd as a going concern, giving a business that is already strong and successful the support and resources it needs to grow, to the benefit of employees, tenants, partners and local communities.”

The Co-operative Group has been hit by financial and personnel issues over the last couple of years and has begun reducing its wide-ranging offerings as a company. Profits from these sales will contribute to paying down the company’s debts and “progress with the delivery of the clear strategic plans” to repair and restore its consumer and retail divisions.

The deal should boost The Wellcome Trust’s position as one of the UK’s largest landlords, and Truell said it sought to “be one of the most responsible” in this field.

The endowment said it would maintain the “Farm to Fork” education initiative, which seeks to teach primary school children about the origins and production of food.

Figures from The Wellcome Trust show it spends around £700 million each year to support education at all levels. It has grown by 153% over the past decade.