An animal feed business with strong links to Ipswich and East Anglia is to lose its historic name as part of a corporate re-branding exercise.

BOCM Pauls, which was bought up by ForFarmers Group in the Netherlands in 2012 to create the largest feed firm in Europe, will come under the umbrella of the ForFarmers brand, its chief executive, Yoram Knoop, announced yesterday.

He also said that the group, which employs 2,200 people across the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and the UK, performed strongly in the first half of 2014, with gross profits up by 6% to £158million compared to the same period last year. Overall turnover declined by 9% £993m, but this was because of lower raw material prices, Mr Knoop explained.

This year, ForFarmers acquired UK-based firms HST Feeds and Wheyfeed and began a programme of increased co-operation within the group.

“We will in the coming months begin the re-branding of our activities in the United Kingdom to the ForFarmers brand and this brand will be used by all other ForFarmers companies within the next 12 months, with the exception of Reudink, Pavo and PoultryPlus,” said Mr Knoop.

Pauls Agriculture was founded in Ipswich in the early 19th Century, trading in malt and barley for the brewing industry. This expanded into trading of maize and other foods for horses. From the early 1900s, it started to produce food for other animals too. BOCM Silcock, originally British Oil and Cake Mills Ltd. also started in the 19th Century and was one of the earliest crushers of oilseeds to make vegetable oils for human consumption and for soap.

BOCM Pauls’ national office is at Wherstead in Ipswich where it employs 40 staff. It also has compound mills at Bury St Edmunds and at Burston in Norfolk. It employs about 1,000 staff across the UK at its 22 sites, including blend plants and compound mills.