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Profits slide 24 per cent

DUBAI - Savola Group, Saudi Arabia’s biggest food producer, said Saturday its fourth-quarter profit declined 24 per cent from a year ago on increase in raw material costs and other expenses.

Fourth-quarter profit fell to SR177 million ($47.2 million) from SR233 million, the company said in a statement on the Saudi bourse website. Full-year 2007 profit, however, rose 7.1 per cent to SR1.23 billion as the company included proceeds from a stake sale in Egyptian Fertilizers Co.

Savola in June sold a 30 per cent stake in Egyptian Fertilisers to UAE-based Abraaj Capital for SAR1.3 billion. The company made a profit of more than SR700 million from the sale, said Savola’s managing director Sami Baroum in the statement.