Land O’Lakes Earns $84 Million

ARDEN HILLS - Feb 2/04 - SNS -- Land O’Lakes, Inc., earned $83.5 million during its 2003 fiscal year, down from $98.9 million for 2002, with a strong fourth quarter again contributing most to the bottom line.

For the fourth quarter, Land O’Lakes reported net earnings of $40.6 million, as compared to $63.6 million for the fourth quarter of 2002. Again, 2002 earnings figures were enhanced by vitamin litigation settlements.

Year-end sales totaled $6.3 billion, an 8% increase over 2002 sales of $5.8 billion. The sales increase was due in part to the consolidation of MoArk (Land O’Lakes egg industry joint venture) into the company balance sheet.

Without that accounting change, sales were up 3% for the year. Similarly, fourth quarter sales of $1.9 billion represented a 24% increase over 2002’s $1.5 billion. However, if you factor out MoArk, sales were up 13% over the fourth quarter of 2002.

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