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For the secretive billionaire Besnier family, the recent recall of potentially dangerous infant formula made by its nearly century-old firm brings an uncomfortable feeling of\u00a0deja vu<\/em>.<\/p>\n Just eight years ago, the French clan behind\u00a0Groupe Lactalis,\u00a0the world\u2019s biggest dairy company,\u00a0 and its chief executive officer \u2014 third-generation scion Emmanuel Besnier \u2014\u00a0went through a similar crisis\u00a0after dozens of infants who consumed formula produced at one of its\u00a0plants in western France were poisoned by salmonella.\u00a0Lactalis was criticized for acting too slowly and charged for failing to recall the product,\u00a0deception and involuntary injuries.\u00a0 The case\u00a0is ongoing.\u00a0<\/p>\n Now, fears that\u00a0baby milk powder\u00a0has been tainted with a toxin that can cause vomiting, diarrhea or worse have\u00a0forced Lactalis and\u00a0better known food giants Nestle SA and Danone SA\u00a0to\u00a0pull products from store shelves around the world over the last few weeks.\u00a0French authorities are investigating whether two infant deaths are linked to consumption of Nestle\u2019s Guigoz brand.\u00a0<\/p>\n As recalls,\u00a0threats of lawsuits\u00a0and accusations of regulatory failures filled the airwaves, Nestle and Danone were\u00a0punished in the stock market.\u00a0<\/p>\n For closely held Lactalis, which\u00a0announced\u00a0its baby formula recall on Jan. 21 \u2014 about two weeks after Nestle first began pulling its own products \u2014 the spotlight is turning to its controlling family, with questions about whether they moved\u00a0quickly enough.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the case of Lactalis, the family is ultimately accountable,\u201d said\u00a0Philippe Pele-Clamour, an adjunct professor at business school HEC Paris who specializes in family firms. \u201cThis can be a problem in crisis management.\u201d<\/p>\n The current scandal involving baby formula makers stems from the possible presence of cereulide, a toxin traced to contaminated arachidonic acid oil, or ARA, from a Chinese supplier. Lactalis said an alert from a French trade body prompted it to \u201cimmediately\u201d test its milk powder.\u00a0<\/p>\n Initial analysis showed both the ARA ingredient and the finished product were \u201ccompliant\u201d but later tests on prepared formula \u201crevealed the presence of cereulide,\u201d it said. Its recall of infant formula marketed under the \u201cPicot\u201d brand and other labels touched 18 of the 47 countries where they are distributed. Lactalis told Bloomberg News it has stopped using the Chinese supplier identified as problematic and has started asking other suppliers for a guarantee on the absence of cereulide.<\/p>\n Both incidents have served to shine a light on the Besniers and the gigantic dairy-based empire they\u2019ve cobbled together over the years through acquisitions, giving them unmatched clout in the industry and frequently throwing them in the midst of controversies. The No. 1 player in the sector, with cheeses, butter, yogurt and other milk products carrying labels like President, Galbani, Parmalat, Yoplait and Kraft, the group has seen its sales grow about six-fold in two decades to reach a record \u20ac30 billion in 2024 \u2014 the latest available figure.<\/p>\n Yet over the years, Emmanuel Besnier and his two siblings have kept a low profile, rarely granting interviews or giving press conferences even as repeated crises earned them bad publicity. Their company is a frequent target of French farmers who accuse it of not paying enough for raw milk. It has also been in the cross hairs of tax authorities. Besnier declined a request for an interview.<\/p>\n There\u2019s little to suggest the current incident will dampen the clan\u2019s ambition to push further into the $51 billion global baby formula industry. Just months after the salmonella scandal, Lactalis announced the acquisition of Aspen Group\u2019s infant formula business for \u20ac740 million, giving it brands like Alula and Infacare sold in Africa, Asia and Latin America. It also said it planned to \u201cdevelop a global infant nutritional business.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n While it\u2019s unclear whether that still stands after the latest health scare, the Besnier clan appears determined to remain dominant in milk. In a rare interview last year with French financial daily Les Echos, Emmanuel Besnier said the commodity is the company\u2019s backbone, with diversification focused on expanding geographically and into related products like yogurt.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cLactalis is a long-term believer in the dairy space,\u201d said Mary Ledman, a former strategist at Rabobank who\u2019s now at industry publication\u00a0The Daily Dairy Report.\u00a0\u201cThey don\u2019t have to worry about quarterly earnings and that has most certainly contributed to their success.\u201d<\/p>\n Based in the northwestern France, the Besniers over the course of three generations have expanded what began as an artisanal cheese-making operation into a multinational entity with products sold in some 150 countries. The three siblings who own the group \u2014 Jean-Michel, 58, Emmanuel, 55, and Marie, 45 \u2014 are now worth a combined $18 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Jean-Michel and Marie are directors at the family\u2019s holding company B.S.A.\u00a0<\/p>\n The media-shy trio\u2019s fortune illustrates the global reach of a clutch of French families who oversee firms built from small operations into industry giants through expansion and acquisitions. France\u00a0dominates\u00a0the luxury sector through companies like LVMH, founded by billionaire Bernard Arnault, and Hermes International, whose controlling family is Europe\u2019s wealthiest. The\u00a0Dassault heirs\u00a0hold global sway in fighter and business jets while the second-generation\u00a0Saades\u00a0control the world\u2019s third largest container shipping line, CMA CGM.<\/p>\n In the case of Lactalis,\u00a0founder Andre Besnier\u00a0made his first 17 Camembert cheeses in 1933 branded \u201cLe Petit Lavallois,\u201d using milk collected near his hometown of Laval, where the company is still based. He expanded over the years into products like butter and cream. After Andre died in 1955, his son Michel took over, creating the President brand, exporting brie to the US and making the group\u2019s first acquisitions. Michel died suddenly in 2000 and Emmanuel took the helm at age 29.\u00a0<\/p>\n As CEO he\u2019s proved to be an aggressive deal-maker, overseeing some 124 acquisitions worth billions of dollars, ranging from Italian mozzarella-maker Galbani and Brazilian milk producer Itambe to General Mills\u2019 yogurt business in the US that includes Yoplait and Kraft Heinz cheese brands like Cracker Barrel.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf they see a target and they want it, they will most likely be the buyer,\u201d Ledman said.<\/p>\n Rabobank said in its 2025 ranking of the world\u2019s 20 biggest dairy companies that \u201cLactalis\u2019 appetite for acquisitions appears insatiable,\u201d noting its\u00a0global dominance and\u00a0comfortable lead over No. 2 Nestle.<\/p>\n While the deals have put Lactalis on the industry\u2019s map as a major player, the group has also had its share of bad news. Repeated clashes with French farmers over milk pricing have taken their toll. A 2016\u00a0dispute\u00a0was particularly noisy, descending into a war of words and leading to government intervention and a concession by Lactalis to raise the rate. The playbook was similar over food inflation coming out of the pandemic.<\/p>\n Lactalis and the Besniers have also found themselves at odds with French tax authorities. In 2024, the company agreed to pay \u20ac475 million to the administration as part of a dispute over international financing through Belgian and Luxembourg entities, according to a filing. The settlement came as political discourse over tax-the-rich policies has intensified in France and helped push net profit down to \u20ac359 million in 2024. The family holding company B.S.A.\u2019s debt stands at \u20ac12 billion, according to Bloomberg data. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Through all their troubles, the family has kept a stony silence, something one can expect again as it traverses its current woes, Pele-Clamour said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe Besnier family has long clung to a culture of opacity,\u201d he said. \u201cThey are rooted in a place that\u2019s far from Paris and other big capitals which helps them to remain discreet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Tainted #baby #milk #hits #billionaire #clans #powerful #dairy #empire<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For the secretive billionaire … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19032,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[857,2375,662,11877,8074,5526,3462,2725,6386,11876,583],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19031"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19031"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19031\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n