Calvo Opens High Capacity Tuna Cannery In Brazilff

The Brazilian canning company Gomes da Costa, part of the Spanish Calvo Group, inaugurated a new plant in South Brazil last week. The new canning facilities will produce tuna and sardine and will increase Gomes da Costa’s production and exports.

An official report released by the company indicated that the canning plant was built within the area of 16,000 squared meters that Gomes da Costa owns in Itajai, in the Southern State of Santa Catarina. The facilities required an investment of USD 14.5 million and has a capacity to produce 1.5 million of “easy open” cans per day.

The Gomes da Costa factory has an annual production capacity of 230 million cans of tuna and sardines. In 2005, the canning plant invoiced USD 140 million in sales.

Nowadays, the factory produces 5 million cans of tuna month and 14 million cans of sardine monthly, 10% of which is exported to Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Japan, Angola, Croatia, El Salvador and Curacao.

With its new canning factory, the company expects to increase its exports by 15% and rise its invoicing to USD 154 million per year.

Gomes da Costa employs 1,200 workers. It was bought in 2004 by the Spanish Group Calvo, which is one of the five biggest seafood canners worldwide, and the market leader in Spain.