Arden Hills, Minn.-Land O’Lakes Inc. reported net income of $61.3 million on sales of $3.26 billion for the first quarter ending March 31, 2008, compared to the year-ago $52.6 million and $2.2 billion. The recent quarter sales included $487 million in crop protection products (CPP) sales that would not have been included in LOL’s financials before the repositioning of Agriliance LLC assets in 2007. With the CPP sales factored out, net sales for the quarter were still up 27 percent. LOL did report a $10.9 million pretax loss in its agronomy business, compared to a year-ago $1.6 million pretax loss. LOL said CPP sales are up 52 percent over first quarter 2007 numbers, and the company expects a solid year for this business. This reflected sales of $487.2 million in first quarter 2008, versus the CPP unit of Agriliance posting $256.4 million in sales in first quarter 2007. The increase was primarily related to sales from the CPP business to the current Agriliance retail business, which were previously recorded as intercompany transfers rather than sales. An estimated $15 million in vendor rebates that would have appeared on the company’s books in the first quarter under previous accounting methods will be booked later in the year.
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