Privatization and the economic performance of Irish Sugar/Greencore

As one of Ireland’s largest agribusiness companies, the Irish Sugar company played a key role in the country’s economic development in the twentieth century. The company was privatized in 1991 (under the new name Greencore) and has since transformed from a largely commodity-based agribusiness into an international convenience food company. This article analyses the financial and economic performance of the company in the 10 years before and after privatization. It finds that the change from public to private ownership was not strongly associated with improved financial performance and productivity as the company had experienced rapid growth and improvement in the pre-privatization period. These findings run counter to perspectives such as public choice theory that suggest a positive relationship between privatization and company performance. Performance in the post-privatization period was strongly influenced by greater exposure to market forces in the company’s expanding food division; however, it is surprising that this greater competition did not translate into improved overall performance.