Published on June 22, 2021
New Grand-Parent sites in America
Since its beginning, exportation has always been linked to the development of Sasso and it has taken an increasingly important place. With our will to be closer to our customers and to provide them with quality birds, we had to develop new production sites in the world.
Sasso and Latin America has a long history. We have been supplying slow-growing colored chicken genetics for over 25 years in this area.
Latin America is a very large market where our animals will face very different conditions, ranging from the tropical areas of Panama to the arid desert of northern Mexico through the highlands of the Andean countries. Latin America has always been the birthplace of the colored poultry genetics with yellow skin and legs, in all these countries there are many local genetics that we can group under the denomination of "pollo Criollo", meaning from local crossbreeding.
The final consumers are looking for a colored chicken of quality, healthy, rustic, performing in terms of growth and yields in basic breeding conditions. These criteria correspond in all points to the characteristics of our lines, that allowed us little by little, to replace the local genetics less efficient and especially without any health safety. Our breeding program to improve our genetic lines generation after generation, especially thanks to our tests on offspring which improve heat resistance, ensure a better profitability for the whole colored chicken industry.
Nowadays, even if they continue to have exotic local names, such as Chompipollo in Guatemala, Pescuezo Pelado in Mexico or Pollo Carioco in Colombia, they all come from Sasso’s genetic.
The will of Sasso being the regional proximity with its customers, as well as the health safety of supply in case of avian influenza crisis in Europe, we set up two sites of Grands Parentals farm, as well as back up of pedigree line on the American soil.
Being part of the Hendrix Genetics group since 2017, we had the opportunity to implant GP flocks in 2019 on 2 sites used by our colleagues of Hendrix Genetics BU layers.
In Canada, our farms and our hatchery are located in Ontario, in Cambridge, one-hour drive from Toronto International Airport. This site allows us to export to Canada, the United States, Central America and the Caribbean mainly, but it could also serve as a base in the future for some exports to Asian countries.
In Brazil we use Hendrix LTDA's hatchery in Salto in the state of Sao Paulo. From this site we can export to all South America and some African countries thanks to the many air connections between the two continents.
Despite the exceptional situation we experienced following the Covid-19 pandemic, and the impossibility for our teams to travel, the synergy and exchange between our French teams and the teams on site were the key to the success of the implementation of these two sites.
Being able to export from these two hatcheries gives us many advantages. First of all, the geographical proximity with our customers allows us to reduce their transport costs. Less flight time also permits us to reduce the fatigue of our animals and limit the risks of mortality.
This installation is in line with the sustainability policy set up by the HG group. Improvement of animal welfare, reduction of its carbon footprint by optimizing transport solutions, and when possible, combining exports with batches of layers for a common customer.
After one year of production and export from these two sites, we are already looking to the future by increasing our production volumes, in order to seek new accessible markets from these areas and to promote our new range of traditional layer lines.
