Nestle sales slip 2% in the Q1

Consumer goods maker Nestle today reported a 2.1 per cent fall in sales to 25.17 billion Swiss francs (about $21.54 billion) for the first quarter ended March.

The company had sales to the tune of 25.71 billion Swiss francs in the year-ago period, it said in a statement today.

During the first quarter, the firm saw an organic growth of 3.8 per cent.

"Acquisitions, net of divestitures, had a negative impact of 0.7 per cent on group sales, as did the currency effect of 5.2 per cent due to the strength of the Swiss franc compared to most other currencies.

"These two factors resulted in a reduction in Nestle Group sales of 2.1 per cent to 25.2 billion Swiss francs," the statement said.

In the first quarter, the company noted that it had sales of 5.2 billion Swiss francs in Europe, 7.5 billion Swiss francs in America, while its sales for the Asia and Africa zone stood at 3.7 billion Swiss francs, among other regions.

Nestle Chief Executive Officer Paul Bulcke said the Group achieved positive organic growth in the first quarter of 2009.

"Our response to the challenging economic environment in 2009 has been to seize new opportunities, accelerating key initiatives in areas such as product affordability, innovation and renovation, as well as cost efficiencies," Bulcke said.