South African food company Tiger Brands has agreed to sell its processed meat divisions in two separate transactions for R428m ($24.7m).

Molare Proprietary will buy Tiger Brands’ abattoir business in Olifantsfontein while Silver Blade Abattoir Proprietary, a wholly owned subsidiary of Country Bird Holdings, will acquire the meat processing factories in Germiston, Polokwane and Pretoria.

Molare is a leading piggery business in South Africa and a key supplier to the abattoir.

Under the deal, Molare will acquire the abattoir for R117m ($6.7m) while Silver Blade will acquire meat processing factories for R311m ($17.8m).

Reuters quoted Tiger Brands chief executive Noel Doyle as saying: “One of the major outcomes we would have achieved by selling the businesses as going concerns is that the jobs of almost 1,000 employees will be safeguarded.”

The company’s meat business closed in 2018 after the South African Health Ministry confirmed the listeria outbreak started at the company’s Enterprise Foods facility.

According to Tiger Brands, the divestiture of the meat processing business is part of a strategic review initiated before this outbreak. The review concluded that the meat business was ‘not an ideal fit’ within the group’s portfolio.