A relatively small crowd of somewhere around 200 farmers turned up for the first of the Glanbia “spin-out” information meetings in Kilkenny on Tuesday night.

There were very few questions or dissenting voices from the floor at the meeting. Given where the value of the business has gone since the last vote in 2012, it’s probably somewhat understandable.

Chairman Liam Herlihy pointed out: “In terms of value, two years ago the co-op was worth €900m and today the value is closer to €2.1bn. So we can decide to leave that €2.1bn in a bottle or release a small proportion from the top of the bottle to our members. If farmers vote yes to these current board proposals, Glanbia co-op will still be left with €1.8bn in value.”

The format of the meeting was very simple. Glanbia chairman Liam Herlihy and group managing director of Glanbia plc and the co-op, Siobhan Talbot, showed slides explaining why the board is proposing this option.

Both were at pains to point out that all value from this proposed spin-out of value was to be retained by farmers.

There were some questions from the floor about why €5 was picked as the magic number for the value of the co-op share.

Siobhan Talbot explained: “It is a compromise figure based on the core logic that it wasn’t unreasonable for new farmer suppliers that need to buy shares and yet reasonable for those farmers who want to cash in some of their co-op shares.

“Yes, while we might assume the underlying value of shares is more, there is no assurance when that will be realised or distributed and really this is an entirely voluntary decision.”

There are four proposals that will go to a vote on Thursday 14 May in Gowran. The first two proposals to be voted on are the release of €170m in value to members via a plc share spin-out and secondly the creation of a €68m members support fund to prop up milk price by selling plc shares.

The other three proposals are a share buy-back plan, the issuing of new shares and rule changes for plc ownership and board membership.

Questions from floor

Question: “Any idea what percentage of the 59% of shares not held by the co-op are held by farmers – ie do we know what real farmer control is?”

Siobhan Talbot: “As best we can judge, it is between 15 and 20% held by farmers as individuals, so there is a big connect to plc as individuals or through co-op”.

Question: “Board reduction to seven farmer members – will that not affect co-op influence in plc in future?”

Siobhan Talbot: “Seven out of 15 at that point in time for me is still big representation. All board members are aligned.”

Question: “Did the co-op consider buying the agribusiness part of the plc?

Siobhan Talbot: “No in truth. Liam Herlihy: “We wanted to keep this vote clean and help tidy up the share register.”

The meetings will continue through April.