Chiquita Brands International Inc. (NYSE:CQB), announced today it has entered into definitive agreements to sell its banana-producing and port operations in Colombia to Invesmar Ltd., the holding company of C.I. Banacol S.A. Banacol is a Colombia-based producer and exporter of bananas and other fruit products. CQB will sell the unit about $51.5 million.
Chiquita is being probed by the U.S. government for making payments to what the U.S. government calls terrorist organizations, to protect employees there.
Chiquita Communications Director Michael Mitchell says the sale will not affect the investigation, but that it contributed to the company's decision to discontinue operations in Colombia, which account for about 9% of the company's banana volume.
Under terms of the deal, Chiquita will receive $28.5 million in cash, $15 million in notes and deferred payments, and will assume $8 million in pension liabilities.
Also on Friday, thousands of banana workers in Colombia, the world's largest third-largest exporter of the fruit, returned to their jobs after a 15-day strike ended with a new wage agreement, a union official said.
The strike, the Colombian sector's longest since 1989, caused about $15 million in losses.
Chiquita said the groups made threats against its workers and that it made the payments only to protect its employees.
The admission appeared unprecedented, as it is an open secret in Colombia that companies are occasionally forced to buy off illegal armed groups fighting in the country's four-decade-old war.
Chiquita ships bananas from plants in northern Colombia in areas with a heavy presence of the outlawed far-right United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, which has been linked to some of the worst human rights abuses in recent Colombian history.
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