The local company behind the popular fertiliser product had to sell the brand due to unsustainable financial losses.
While director Harold Clapham said the company takes some responsibility for the business “financially struggling for a number of years now”, he said the ‘last straw’ was the NSW Government’s inability to adequately support the company’s ideas to secure a sustainable commercial quantity of carp for processing.
“Most of the cause is the inability to access commercial quantities of carp, and for years we’ve been trying to negotiate with the NSW Government to access their control sites.
“We have developed a solution for harvesting carp, in the way of carp traps, but we’re not allowed to develop our infrastructure on government controlled sites for a period that would be sustainable.
“We would need access for four to five years to justify the investment, but the NSW Government will not give us that security.
“And so now, we cannot continue to operate. It is absolutely ghastly.”
The company negotiated the sale of the brand and existing stock to DuluxGroup, who have brought the brand under the Yates umbrella.
“Yates plans to retain fish sourcing and bulk processing at Deniliquin, maintaining it in the local community where it has proximity to fish supply and local sourcing relationships,” DuluxGroup said.
“Yates plans to invest in the growth of Charlie Carp, taking advantage of Yates’ customer and distribution reach, along with our marketing and R&D capability.”
The Pastoral Times understands two staff have been retained at Denilqiuin, from the seven that were employed by the Deniliquin company.
Mr Clapham said while the brand has been sold, the company structure that started Charlie Carp would be retained.
The company maintains its commitment to harvesting carp and removing the invasive pest from our waterways, but said this is entirely in dependent on the NSW Government’s attitude towards its proposals on commercial harvesting.
But Mr Clapham said this development with Charlie Carp means two of the region’s most recognised brands have been impacted by government policy in the last few months.
“Charlie Carp and SunRice are two of the most recognisable brands in this town, and both have great retail reputations.
“Aspects of this sale are undoubtedly our doing - we have made mistakes and take responsibility for them - but being forced to sell falls on the NSW Government.
“We’ve been trying for years to negotiate implementing our carp traps, and we’ve had letters of support from the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, Federal Government and key politicians, but to no avail.
“We’ve invested a lot of time and money into the carp trap plan, and they would have had such a significant upside for us and for what the government is trying to do in improving the health of the river system.
“We’re the only existing business in the Murray-Darling that takes carp out of the system, and the way we’ve been treated is just terrible.
“And what’s makes it worse is that at the same time we’re forced to sell, the NSW Government invests $1.9 million to build a new carp processing facility at Lake Cargelligo (funded by the Regional Development Trust).”
The sale of the Charlie Carp has enabled the Deniliquin company to pay local creditors.
Shareholders are still shouldering the remainder of the loss, but the company hopes to sell off equipment not required by Yates to recover more of the losses.
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