SALES GROWTH. Mega Prime Food Inc. (MPFI) chief growth and development officer Marvin Tiu-Lim targets an 18-percent sales growth this year, sustaining the expansion in the last five years. Tiu-Lim traced his optimism to additional distribution following the opening of its new manufacturing plant in Santo Tomas, Batangas, as well as the bid to beef up the company's sales team to have more people who will go to grassroots, such as the sari-sari (variety) stores. (Photo by Joann S. Villanueva) MANILA - An executive of Mega Prime Food Inc. (MPFI) targets around 18 percent rise in sales this year, sustaining its increase in the last five year, due in part to wider distribution channels and increased production. In an interview during the inauguration of the company's PHP1-billion state-of-the-art manufacturing plant in Santo Tomas town, Batangas province on Wednesday, MPFI chief growth and development officer Marvin Tiu-Lim said they also aim to increase their product selection and beef-up their sales and distribution team to further boost sales. "We intend to making sure that our products are more accessible to more and more Filipinos," he said. To date, the newly-inaugurated manufacturing plant produces around 300,000 cans per day since it has one operational canning line that is operating. Tiu-Lim said they will add two more lines this year to eventually increase the daily production to around 900,000. He said this will greatly boost the 2.4 million daily production of their manufacturing plants in Zamboanga. However, Tiu-Lim said "this is just the capacity" of the manufacturing plants. "This depends on the fish catch," he said, citing the supply issues for Tamban (sardines) the company faced in 2022 due to the impact of La Nina. Tiu-Lim said fishing season resumes on Thursday after the regular close fishing season from Nov. 30 to March 1. "We're hoping that this season will be good and fish will be abundant so we can lower the price and make sure that availability is there," he added. Tiu-Lim said the share of the new manufacturing plant to total production is targeted to be around 20 to 30 percent by the end of this year, but this is expected to grow to around 40 to 50 percent in the coming years. He said the company is eyeing to do an initial public offering (IPO) in the succeeding years to help boost capital but added nothing is definite yet. (PNA) }