Good day, everyone. And welcome to Fresh Del Monte Produce’s First Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Today’s conference call is being broadcast live over the internet and is also being recorded for playback purposes. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker’s remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions] For opening remarks and introductions, I would like to turn today’s call over to the Vice President, Investor Relations with Fresh Del Monte Produce, Ms. Christine Cannella. Please go ahead, Ms. Cannella.

Thank you, Regina. Good afternoon, everyone. And thank you for joining our first quarter 2025 conference call. Joining me in today’s discussion are Mr. Mohammad Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Ms. Monica Vicente, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. I hope that you had a chance to review the press release that was issued earlier via Business Wire. You may also visit the company’s IR website at investorrelations.freshdelmonte.com to access today’s earnings materials and to register for future distribution. This conference call is being webcast live on our website and will be available for replay after this call. Please note that our press release and our call today include non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures are set forth in the press release and earnings presentation, which is available on our website. I would like to remind you that much of the information we will be speaking to today, including the answers we give in response to your questions, may include forward-looking statements within the Safe Harbor provisions of the federal securities laws. In today’s press release and in our SEC filings, we detail risks that may cause our future results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Our statements are as of today, April 30th, and we have no obligation to update any forward-looking statement we may make. During the call, we will provide a business update, along with an overview of our first quarter 2025 financial results, followed by a question-and-answer session. With that, I will turn today’s call over to Mr. Mohammad Abu-Ghazaleh. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Christine. And thanks, everybody, on this call for joining us for our first quarter of 2025 earnings call. We began the year with continued momentum, building on the progress we made throughout 2024. Our results this quarter reflect strong starts driven by solid demand in key categories, a more optimized product mix and continued focus on operational efficiency. We saw meaningful year-over-year improvements in both gross profit and gross margin, particularly within our Fresh and Value-Added segment, affirming the effectiveness of our strategy and the discipline behind its execution. Pineapples continued to perform well, with demand once again exceeding supply, a clear reflection of our leadership in this cornerstone category. Leveraging that leadership, we are closely tracking global production conditions and actively managing the ongoing imbalance between supply and demand. As consumption continues to grow across markets, we have taken strategic steps to strengthen supply continuity and secure consistent availability for our customers, allowing us to stay ahead of the curve and better anticipate future demand. At the same time, we continue to see strong consumer interest in avocados and fresh-cut fruit, two categories that are central to our long-term growth strategy. These products play an increasingly important role in how consumers engage with fresh produce, and they are a critical part of our expansion plans, which we look forward to sharing in more detail in the months ahead. This quarter further demonstrated the operational resilience provided by our vertically integrated supply chain, particularly amidst persistent global shipping disruptions marked by container equipment scarcity, constrained vessel capacity and escalating port congestion. To-date, we have been able to move products with minimal to no delays, giving our customers a level of service continuity that few can match. On the topic of agility, it is important to address the current…

Thank you, Mr. Abu-Ghazaleh, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on today’s call. I will begin with our financial results for the first quarter of 2025 and then I will share our outlook for the remainder of the year. As Christine mentioned, our press release and our call today include non-GAAP measures. Reconciliations of these non-GAAP financial measures are set forth in the press release and earnings presentation, which is available on our website. Now let’s move on to our financial results for the first quarter of 2025. Net sales were $1,098 million, compared with $1,108 million in the prior year. The decrease was driven by lower net sales in our Banana segment, primarily a result of lower sales volume and the negative impact of fluctuations in exchange rates, partially offset by higher net sales in our Fresh and Value-Added Product segment, driven by higher per unit selling prices. Gross profit for the first quarter of 2025 was $92 million, compared with $82 million in the prior year. The increase in gross profit for the quarter was driven by higher net sales in our Fresh and Value-Added Product segment, partially offset by higher per unit production, procurement and distribution costs. Gross margin for the first quarter was 8.4%, compared with 7.4% in the prior year. This also includes -- this also reflects a sequential increase from 6.8% in the fourth quarter of 2024. Adjusted gross profit for the first quarter was $92 million, compared with $81 million last year. Operating income for the first quarter of 2025 was $45 million, compared with $44 million last year. The increase in operating income was driven by higher gross profit, partially offset by lower gain on disposal of property, plant and equipment net. Adjusted operating income was $44 million,…

[Operator Instructions] Our first question will come from the line of Mitch Pinheiro with Sturdivant & Co. Please go ahead.

Yeah. Hi. Good morning. Can you hear me?

Good morning, Mitch. Yes. We can hear you.

Good morning.

Yeah. Great. Good morning. So, Mohammad, I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the produce category and your categories within that, what you’re seeing in terms of demand. We -- obviously, the consumer is under pressure, but what are you seeing in your categories relative to that and what you expect here in the next quarter or so?

What we see is a very continuous solid demand in our sector, which is the fresh produce, be it fruits or vegetables. We don’t see any kind of reductions in demand or consumption. I believe this will continue as we are very kind of basic, reasonably priced segment in terms of cost. So I’m confident that this is not going to change. As a matter of fact, disruptions that is happening right now in the market sometimes opens opportunities for us, which we are looking at and maybe a good time for probably picking up some good opportunities there.

So, I mean, it’s interesting. What are you seeing significant players in the industry having sort of logistic issues that you’re going to take advantage of or is it more broadly just some of the weaker players, sort of more broadly having issues?

You definitely named it, Mitch. Actually, with this kind of environment that we are going through, the disruptions, be it on the logistic side, on all fronts, really, have put -- I would say put small-, medium-sized companies or operators at a disadvantage because of the hardships that is being created by these disruptions. So, in our case, yes, we are very flexible. We are very, very agile. We can adapt to the situation. Our logistical full integration from the supply chain gives us a very big leverage in terms of being able to move forward without any disruptions or interruptions in our operations. And that’s the most important thing is that your customers’ demands or your customer requirements are fulfilled on time without any interruptions. And that’s really the big element here in this situation is between somebody that can deliver on time and in full and someone that cannot do that. So, you are right. What you just mentioned is very true.

Let me ask. So, with regard to the 10% baseline tariffs, what’s happening in the market? Are we seeing producers such as yourself and retailers passing it through to the consumer? Is there any part of the sales processes seeing any particular group eating some of the tariffs to keep prices low? Are you going to pass it all through?

Well, we have been mitigating this in a very friendly and cooperative way with our buyers. And in order not really to negatively impact the consumers in a way. So, we are working very closely with our buyers to mitigate this tariff increase, which I believe for the best -- for the good of buyers and sellers as well. So, yes, we are mitigating this with our buyers.

Okay. And then, you mentioned in the prepared remarks or on the slides that part of the margin driver in Fresh and Value-Added was pineapple, I guess, and melons. I was curious how you were doing in avocado?

Avocado is doing very well, as Christine mentioned and this category is growing and we are diversifying as well our sourcing from Peru, from Colombia and other places. So this -- I believe that this segment of the business is to keep growing going forward. But it’s not only pineapple and avocados and fresh-cut. We do have other items right now that are maybe small, not to mention them, in any significant manner, but they are starting to be becoming very important also part of our portfolio. I mean, on the logistics side, this is one side on all new businesses that we are just in the infancy stage on the residues, on other, as we go forward, quarter-after-quarter and year-after-year, this will be very meaningful going forward. And we cannot just say right now what we are doing, but everything that will happen in the next few quarters will be announced and will be kind of highlighted to the market. Because there are many things in the pipeline that is already started, probably, in one way or the other that are ramping up and some of it probably a little, like on the biofertilizers, like even on conventional fertilizers that we started working on production and distribution. We are talking here about margins in the high 20s and things like that. So, these businesses as they grow and they are growing will have a significant and very impactful results going forward in the future.

And then, are we at point in fresh-cut where you have absorbed a lot of the newer capacity you added and that we should see more stable and increasing sort of margins as you leverage those fixed costs here? Are we at that point where you’re beyond even some volume disruptions that you can still maintain pretty strong margins in that area?

Yeah. I think we do. I believe that our fresh-cut fruit operation is getting stronger year-after-year and with our rationalization and increased efficiency and better sourcing that gives us a leverage to continue performing similarly or even better going forward in the future, Mitch. So, I’m not very concerned about the fresh-cut. I think, just to give you an example with our fresh guacamole, which we started, let’s say, less than a year ago, we are having double-digit growth every quarter-over-quarter, I mean, we cannot cope even with demand.

And then last question was on the pineapple business. Obviously, it’s your core business and what drives everything at your firm -- at your company. But why -- could you just go back, obviously, pineapples have been in sort of short supply for a little bit, but what was driving that? And how long does it take for supplies to normalize from this point?

Let’s put it in another way. Maybe consumption is increasing and demand is increasing. And that’s why we see now, more or less, the supply is a little bit shorter than the demand. I’m not saying drastically shorter, but a little bit shorter than demand. I think the major factor here is that the demand and consumption is increasing. If you look at the price of pineapples compared to any other fruit on the shelf, be it apple, be it grapes, be it berries or any other fruit, you will realize that the cost of pineapple compared to the rest is quite favorable. It’s very still inexpensive to, I mean, as a family, as a household, I would take a pineapple that can feed the whole family, maybe for two days rather than having £2 [ph] of apples or oranges that would cost me 3 times as much. So I believe, I mean, this is one of the factors why we see more consumption of pineapple. Aside from the young generation realizing that the health benefits of pineapple as well is extremely high compared to other fruits. So I think there are several factors playing here. One is the price compared to others, as well as all the health and wellness benefits coming from pineapple rather than other fruits.

I also think your Honeyglow is a fantastic pineapple variety and I think that in and of itself, getting that kind of quality of pineapple would also induce demand continued purchasing of that product. So…

Absolutely. Absolutely.

… kudos to you. Yeah. Kudos to you for the innovation in that and your other Pinkglow and Rubyglow and other innovations. That’s all I have here. Thank you for your time and the answers.

Thank you, Mitch. I appreciate it. Thank you very much for your comments.

Thank you, Mitch.

[Operator Instructions] That will conclude our question-and-answer session. And I will now hand the call back over to Mr. Mohammad Abu-Ghazaleh for closing remarks.

Thank you so much. I would like to thank everyone today for having to be with us here and hope to talk to you on better news on our next quarter. Thank you. Have a good day.

Ladies and gentlemen, that will conclude today’s meeting. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect.