In October 2004 TSB Sugar Holdings (Proprietary) Limited (TSB), a major sugar producer in South Africa, acquired Booker Tate. TSB is a wholly owned subsidiary of Remgro, an investment holding company listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
Booker Tate was formed in 1988 when Booker plc and Tate & Lyle plc, two major international food production and trading companies, merged their agro-industrial and project management businesses to form a jointly owned company.
Based in Thame, Oxfordshire in the UK with a subsidiary, PT Booker Tate Indonesia, located in Jakarta, Indonesia, the mainstream business of Booker Tate is the provision of development, management and technical services to the global sugar cane industry. Although Booker Tate has provided services to a broad range of agribusiness companies in the past, the present focus of its activities is on cane sugar producing companies and this has been the dominant activity in the company's substantial history.
Booker Tate employs a number of permanent staff members, including a core of head office-based specialists. The total establishment includes project and corporate managers, agronomists, agricultural engineers, irrigation and civil engineers, factory engineers (mechanical, electrical, chemical and instrumentation), sugar technologists, human resources and training specialists, accountants, financial analysts, economists and information technology specialists.
In addition, Booker Tate is able to draw upon a wide network of specialists throughout the sugar world.