Page 50 - Biorefinery 2030 Future Prospects for the Bioeconomy (2015)

2 History 17

was in regular demand from malt makers. In 1961, it decided to begin producing
malted barley, to obtain the added value for itself, and built the first malting plant in
Europe totally financed by the members of a cooperative. The project was a success,
with an expanding export market, and partnerships with other cooperatives via the
“PROVIDENCE Malt” union launched in 1977, followed by the building and
acquisition of additional plants. At the same time, another group, “Union Cham-
pagne Malt,” set up in 1970 on the initiative of a dozen or so local cooperatives,
¸
built the huge malting plant in Vitry le Francois. However, in the 1980s, in a context
of overproduction and brewery takeovers, Guy Joly and Jacques de Bohan, the
heads of the two malting unions, managed to persuade the members of their
cooperatives to give up their parochial squabbling and merge in a new entity,
“Malteurop,” which is today the world leader in its sector.

2.4.2 Agricultural Cooperatives, Milling and Maize Processing
In Champagne, wheat has always been a key crop, and as long ago as the 1920s, the
cooperatives were operating large silos. Flour milling was carried out in the region
by a number of family mills, each of which had its quota of milling capacity.
However, in 1973, la PROVIDENCE Agricole decided to buy up the “Grands
Moulins de Reims” a large regional mill, which was experiencing financial
problems, to sustain the milling industry in the region, supplied by local farmers
and thus a source of significant revenue for them. This was the beginning of a
concentration movement that spread throughout the region, notably with the crea-
tion of the “Intermeunerie” cooperative in the Aube de ´partement, the result of a
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partnership between two cooperatives (SCARM and CARB ).
At the end of the 1980s, and following these mergers and takeovers, the region
had two competing leaders in the milling sector, each of which was pursuing a
strategy of expansion. These were the Aube de ´partement firm “Moulins Soufflet,”
which in 1994, after a number of acquisitions, became the leading milling company
in Europe, and the Reims firm Euromill, set up as a partnership between the
cooperative “CHAMPAGNE CEREALES” and six other local cooperatives.
At this time, Euromill was an important player in the sector, but nonetheless it
struggled to remain profitable (CAP reform, export crisis etc.) The economic
situation of the cooperative group “Intermeunerie” was experiencing the same
difficulties, and the directors of the two firms decided on a merger. The aim was
to have enough resources to pursue their development and achieve optimal size.
This strategy took shape in 2001 with the creation of a joint venture with the
“Grands Moulins de Paris” under the name of “Intermill” (which since then has
become Nutrixo). This partnership with a leader in the milling and bakery sector,
but whose activity concentrated on the second of these (baking and pastry making,

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Socie ´te ´ coope ´rative agricole de la re ´gion de Romilly-Me ´ry (Romilly-Me ´ry Area Agricultural
cooperative).
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Coope ´rative agricole de la re ´gion de Brienne (Brienne Area Agricultural Cooperative).