Europe West Indies Lines (EWL), the Dutch shipping firm which teamed up with Fyffes last year to bring the Irish importer’s fruit to Europe, has filed for bankruptcy.
Fyffes united with EWL in June last year, to operate the first direct shipping service to link Ireland to North and South America from Dublin, bringing in pineapples and bananas and backhauling Irish exports to the US, Canada, the Caribbean and South America.
Within a month, Fyffes felt obliged to play down rumours that the trans-Atlantic shipping service was already encountering problems. This was after the ship commissioned to operate the service experienced engine trouble some 300 miles off Mizen Head and needed to be towed to Foynes, on the Shannon estuary.
The issues continued to plague the business, however, and Fyffes chairman David McCann said the EWL business had experienced ‘‘trading difficulties’’ in 2008 when announcing Fyffes half-year results last week. Fyffes has lost around €7 million (£5.6m) loss on its investment
It has reportedly written off money owed to it by the business and incurred additional one-off costs in finding alternative ways to ship its produce across the Atlantic at short notice.
