Second Business: Entrepreneurs Discover the Potential of Domestic Agriculture

From time to time, we hear from our entrepreneurs that they have expanded their business into agriculture, where they clearly see an opportunity for development, but also for business diversification. Probably as a kind of insurance should their core business go awry. They invest serious money and launch serious projects and believe in them. But this trend is not limited to Croats.

For example, there are also entrepreneurs in Serbia, among them Milan Popović, better known as the king of copper, who has invested in agriculture, specifically – in fruit growing. So far, he has not invested in agriculture in Croatia.

– I have only invested in Serbia in an apple orchard of 100 hectares and a corresponding cold storage facility. I invested about 20 million euros because I assessed that this is the most lucrative business in these regions. We will just have to see if I was right – says Popović.

Two friends, Đuro Tadić and Zvonko Belošević, co-owners of the company Sisak stan for building management and apartment rentals, also believe that agriculture is lucrative. Tadić was the director until 2017, since then he has been at the head of the Supervisory Board of the company, while his friend Belošević, who also has his own family farm near Petrinja, is a member of the Supervisory Board. The two of them, after long preparations related to land, finances, and other conditions, invested in two hazelnut plantations in the vicinity of Glina in 2016, on the slopes of Zrinjska gora. They currently have 16 hectares, and this year an additional four hectares are planned.

– We established a subsidiary company Korprodukti in Jošavica near Petrinja to separate the agricultural activity from the core business of the company. Our first goal is to complete the process of growing and processing hazelnuts on 20 hectares, which involves investing in facilities and equipment. The key to successful development of agricultural activity would be the association of more participants in the activity at all stages of business because individually we are all small and weak – says Tadić.

Idiotic Fastest Finger

It is certain that the experience of Belošević’s family farm was one of the incentives for them to start investing in agriculture alongside their core real estate business. However, Belošević also points out some other reasons, such as the fact that the potential income from a permanent hazelnut plantation lasts between 40 and 50 years, and they considered the abandoned agricultural land in the Sisak-Moslavina area to be a significant potential that needs to be utilized for business purposes.

While we talk to them, one can feel their attachment to their homeland, but also to nature. They are very connected to the slopes of Zrinjska gora, and they tell us that their hearts ache due to its great neglect. The state land on which the hazelnut plantation is now located was completely neglected after the war, overgrown with thorns and bushes. They received it for lease at a symbolic price, they say, for 50 years, cleared it, planted trees, and they suggest that it would be good for thousands of uncultivated hectares in Banija and Moslavina to be granted free of charge to anyone, as long as they cultivate it. A few kilometers away in the hamlet of Stapari, the two of them bought an old devastated elementary school, renovated it, and put on a new roof. It will serve as a storage facility for hazelnuts, and perhaps for processing, they say, as they are considering producing the increasingly sought-after hazelnut oil.

– So far, investments amount to over four million kuna, and we have not managed to use a single kuna from any fund. The syndrome of the idiotic invention of the fastest finger… – says Belošević with a grim face.

—

Željko Vučemil

photo

—

Another entrepreneur who has invested in agriculture, even though it is not his core business, is co-owner of the VMD group Željko Vučemil. This is a family investment in the Slavonski Brod company Hlad, which was on the brink of bankruptcy. The company is engaged in the cultivation and processing of cherries and apples, as well as freezing and packaging for further industrial processing, and most of its products are exported to France and Germany. Vučemil, he says, bought receivables from banks and saved the company from collapse, which will operate at a profit after losses in previous years. In addition to purchasing receivables, the new owner invested in a solar power plant of 1.2 megawatts on the roofs of the cold storage and processing facilities for cherries and apples.

Read more in the new issue of digital and printed edition of Lider.