A member of the fifth generation since the creation of the family business, Bruno Bonduelle was CEO of the French specialist in canned and frozen vegetables from 1985 to 1994, before becoming head of the Supervisory Board and then a member of the Board of Directors. He has helped make Bonduelle one of the world’s leading plant-based food companies, with four brands, 11,900 employees and an entire ecosystem in which the Maïsadour Cooperative Group is a stakeholder. Michel Prugue, Chairman of the Maïsadour Cooperative Group, wishes to pay tribute to the memory of Bruno Bonduelle:
I would like to pay tribute to Bruno Bonduelle and his work at the head of the family group. With the Bonduelle Group, he has contributed to structuring the link between farmers and industrialists and to enhancing the value of the work of producers in the Southwest.
BONDUELLE AND THE SOUTH WEST
The Bonduelle Group produces on a large scale, in plants that are geographically focused and respectful of people and the planet. It is the world leader in sweet corn. Bonduelle has been present in Aquitaine since the mid-1970s. Since then, its activities in the Southwest have expanded significantly. Our shared history lies in the ties that Bonduelle has forged with its partner cooperatives in the Southwest. 450 producers in the Gers, Gironde, Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques regions, represented by Euralis, Maïsadour and Vivadour, supply sweet corn, green beans and/or peas to the famous brand.
Historical partners
Maïsadour has been working with Bonduelle for over 30 years. This goes back to the days of the Bonmaïs plant in Haut-Mauco. In 2005, Bonduelle created Soléal with the three cooperatives from the South-West of France mentioned above, with the aim of developing and sustaining the sector in the region. Today, the Maïsadour cooperative group supplies Soléal and its two plants in Labenne and Bordères-et-Lamensans with sweet corn exclusively for canning. 80 producers in the Landes and Gironde regions of France grow this corn on 2,500 hectares, representing some 50,000 tons of sweet corn.
A long-lasting collaboration
The Southwest offers Bonduelle a guarantee of sustainability and volume to meet the growth in the sweet corn market. Future projects will enable the company to consolidate its business through major industrial investments. A new production line planned for 2023 will increase the production capacity of the Bordères plant, which employs 450 people, by 12,000 metric tons. The human and professional links between Bonduelle and Maïsadour go beyond the simple customer-supplier relationship, as Pierre Harambat, Vice President in charge of Sustainable Development at Maïsadour, points out:
A collaboration in 5 dates
