Cargill is selling its two Texas cattle feedlots as it continues to redefine its protein businesses. It is Cargill’s latest in a series of divestments in businesses with low margins, specifically those in meat. A year ago, Cargill sold its entire pork business to JBS USA Pork for $1.45 billion, a deal that combined two of the country’s largest pork processors.
“Selling our feed yards in the Texas panhandle allows us to redeploy many tens of millions of dollars annually into investments that will help us grow our protein business — money that otherwise would have been tied up as working capital used to purchase and feed cattle,” John Keating, president of Cargill’s Wichita, Kan.-based beef business, said in a statement. Cargill, the largest privately held company in the U.S., has spent about $500 million in the last year on protein-related acquisitions or facility upgrades with an eye fixed on higher growth markets.