Lapanday Foods Corporation - Davao

About Lapanday Foods Corporation - Davao

Lapanday Foods Corporation is a fully owned subsidiary of Lapanday Holdings Corporation, a private group based principally in the Philippines offering products and services targeted toward international markets. We have intensified our focus on our core strength - globally competitive agribusiness - as manifested by our fresh produce company managing our operations and facilities in Mindanao with an integrated "seed-to-shelf" capability. We deliver Philippine brands (primarily bananas and pineapples) to export markets. We continuously benchmark against global players. We provide jobs not only to our 4,000 full-time employees, but also to over 2,000 small farmers, and 15,000 people in related service businesses. We have the resources and expertise to take advantage of the opportunities for growth and expansion as we continue to be an effective provider of world class quality fresh produce using the latest and most environmentally-accepted agriculture technology to our customers and distributors in the Asia Pacific region and the Middle East. History Lapanday Foods Corporation is known today as one of the leading fresh produce growers and exporters in the Philippines; but years ago, its beginnings were planted in a small seed. On three parcels of land near Davao City, banana farms had flourished in the 1970's but had become virtually abandoned in the 1980's as world oversupply depressed banana export prices. Luis F. Lorenzo, Sr., whose family had deep roots in Mindanao, looked at these lands and saw the opportunity amid the challenges. The Lorenzos acquired the Guihing, Lapanday, and Cadeco farms from the Ayala-Aboitiz group in 1982. During the turbulent 1980's, even while the Lapanday farms got caught in the middle of armed conflict, the Lorenzo-led management focused single mindedly on turning the business around. Through its purposive and sustained partnership progress with the farm managers and workers to resolve operational and labor related problems, the road to recovery got underway. When the world opened for trade in 1997, it marked Lapanday Foods Corporation’s expansion from being a grower and packer for multinational brands to being a respected exporter and regional produce supplier in its own right. The first Philippine brands of fresh fruit were introduced to the global market – “Mabuhay,” “Estrella,” and “Aloha” – all grown and packed in farms owned and managed then by Global Fruits Corporation, a fully owned Lapanday subsidiary. As it continued to integrate forward, the Lapanday company established Davao Cold Storage Corporation, Fresh Asia Produce Company International Corporation, Mindanao Fresh Produce Services Corporation, and Lapanday Packaging, Inc. - companies that were eventually folded back into the flagship Lapanday Foods Corporation to strengthen its supply chain capability. Lapanday Diversified Products Corporation remains as its diversification company providing pineapples to a growing number of foreign customers