By Lehlohonolo Lehana.

South Africa's top food producer Tiger Brands announced today that its current CEO CEO Noel Doyle is stepping down, will be replaced by Tjaart Kruger.

Tiger Brand's shares jumped almost 12% early on Friday after it said Doyle would step down.

In a statement the group, said Kruger will take the reins from 1 November 2023. He is a CA with over 30 years of leadership experience in some of South Africa's biggest FMCG companies.

Tjaart has been handed a 26-month-long contract, which the group said will provide certainty to the company and key stakeholders and speed up the group's value-creating strategy.

Doyle will remain available until 31 March 2024 to ensure a smooth handover.

"The Board will commence a process to identify a suitable successor for the CEO role in due course to ensure an orderly transition at the end of Tjaart's tenure," the group said.

Tiger Brands also announced that group operating income for the year ended 30 September 2023 will end lower than FY22. 

It said the ongoing challenges of fully recovering higher input costs persisted in the second half of this year, resulting in marginally lower volumes.

"This, together with the year-on-year impact of incremental retrenchment costs of approximately R100 million, proved too significant to be offset by the group’s cost reduction initiatives, which will end ahead of the R460 million target previously guided," the company said.

In addition, good performances from Beverages, Home & Personal Care, Tiger Food Services Solutions (previously Out of Home), Exports and Deciduous Fruit were offset by poor performances in Rice, Bakeries (despite recording volume growth), Groceries and Snacks & Treats.