(Alliance News) - Africa-focused agriculture and forestry firm Woodbois Ltd said Wednesday its interim loss narrowed as revenue jumped with strong growth reported across both its main operating units.
For the six months ended June, pretax loss improved to USD3.4 million from USD4.7 million the year prior. This was after revenue rose 41% to USD9.3 million from USD6.6 million the year before.
"Notable revenue increases were recorded within both Forestry and Trading divisions," Woodbois Chief Executive Officer Paul Dolan said. "The strong start to 2019 was assisted by further inflows into our Internal Trading Fund, providing management with a high level of confidence that as additional ITF is secured the Trading division can deliver further growth during 2019 and beyond."
During the period, the ITF saw net inflows of USD8.4 million.
"This growth in revenue has been achieved with minimal additional operating expenses, which are annualising just 3% above the 2018 run-rate," Dolan added. "The cost reduction programme embarked upon 12 months ago is now largely complete and has resulted in administration expenses for the first six months of 2019 annualising at 28% below that of 2018."
At the end of June, Woodbois had USD4.3 million in cash, up from USD1.2 million a year prior. This was helped by a GBP5 million equity investment into the firm by 1798 Volantis Fund during the period.
Woodbois does not currently pay a dividend.
"The next target for the board is for our operations to become cash-flow positive while maintaining focus on delivering high-quality products and services to our customer base and continuing to drive the high levels of revenue growth delivered over the last two years," Dolan said.
Dolan added the firm will focus on enhancing efficiency across the group as well as building scale in its trading business.
"The management team is fully committed to each of these goals and is highly motivated and incentivized to pursue them relentlessly", Dolan added.
Shares in Woodbois were 3.0% lower at 5.43 pence in London on Wednesday.
Woodbois (WBI)