Maple Leaf sales surge, profits steady

Maple Leaf Foods reported first-quarter sales of $1.24 billion, an 8.2 per cent increase from the same period last year and profits of $50 million compared with $52 million last year.

Shareholders are scheduled to vote June 11 on the proposal to spin off hog production and slaughter into a new company called Canada Packers.

Sales rose across key divisions - pork by 12 per cent, prepared foods by 7.1 per cent, poultry by six per cent. It did not say how its plant-based protein foods division, Greenleaf Foods, fared.