From a Smallholder Farm to a Global Stage: How New Anthoney's Farms Became Sri Lanka's Sustainability Benchmark

When New Anthoney's Farms took its seat at Soy Connext 2026 in Chicago this August, alongside sustainability honourees from the Americas, Greater China and Southeast Asia, it marked the kind of recognition that rarely comes to a company from Sri Lanka. But for those who have followed the company's journey, it was less a surprise than a milestone that had been years in the making.

The summit, organised by the US Soybean Export Council (USSEC), drew a record turnout of more than 800 delegates to the Hyatt Regency Chicago, the largest in the event's history. During a dedicated sustainability session, New Anthoney's Farms was named among global sustainability leaders for its use of the Sustainable U.S. Soy and Fed with Sustainable U.S. Soy labels, a distinction that placed a Sri Lankan poultry producer squarely alongside some of the world's most established agribusiness names.

It was not the company's first time at the front of this particular queue. In 2023, New Anthoney's Farms became the first company in South Asia to secure the Sustainable U.S. Soy licence, verified under the U.S. Soy Sustainability Assurance Protocol. That early adoption has since made the company a reference point for USSEC when discussing what responsible sourcing looks like in practice, and it sits at the foundation of Anthoney's Feeds, the group's feed milling operation, which supplies the protein rich, traceable feed behind the company's antibiotic free standard.

Sri Lanka's Place in a Global Supply Chain

Sri Lanka's place in that story is larger than a single company. The country was 2025's largest market in the world for containerised US soybean meal, importing roughly 255,000 tonnes last year to feed a domestic animal feed industry producing close to 1.3 million metric tons annually, with poultry as its biggest customer. Sixteen Sri Lankan poultry producers and feed millers currently hold the Sustainable U.S. Soy licence, putting the country among the leaders of the label's adoption in Asia. USSEC CEO Jim Sutter, opening the Chicago summit, framed the moment against a much longer horizon, noting that independent forecasters project global import demand for soy climbing from 247 million metric tons today to 319 million metric tons by 2034, driven by population and income growth in regions, including South Asia, that still have room to add protein to their diets. 

Four Decades Built on a Single Commitment

For a company that began in 1986 as a smallholder poultry enterprise, that global framing is a long way from where the story started. Over four decades, New Anthoney's Farms built its identity around a single, then unusual, commitment: raising poultry without antibiotics at any stage of production. It is a position the company has held onto even as the rest of the industry has moved, at various speeds, toward the same standard. Today, the company describes itself as Sri Lanka's only fully antibiotic free poultry producer, a claim that has become central to both its consumer proposition and its investment case.

A Ten Million Dollar Vote of Confidence

That case was strengthened considerably this year. In June, the International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank Group, announced it would invest up to USD 10 million in New Anthoney's Farms Group. The investment is designed to expand production capacity, strengthen supply chain efficiency and widen access to safe, affordable poultry across the domestic market. At full capacity, the company expects to export 1,936 metric tons of poultry annually, roughly ten percent of total output and a 29 percent increase on 2024 levels, generating an estimated USD 4.95 million in additional foreign exchange earnings by 2032. In 2024 alone, New Anthoney's Farms accounted for more than 90 percent of Sri Lanka's poultry meat exports.

The IFC investment carries a social dimension that extends well beyond the company's own balance sheet. Smallholder farmers currently contribute around 40 percent of New Anthoney's production, and the expansion is expected to create more than 900 new jobs while benefiting at least 200 smallholder farmers through contract farming and outgrower schemes, with roughly 22 percent of participants expected to be women and 80 percent from low income households. Sri Lanka's poultry sector remains a critical source of affordable protein and food security, yet smallholder farms, which make up 85 percent of the sector, supply less than 30 percent of total output, often held back by constraints in productivity and market access. Strengthening that value chain, rather than simply scaling one company's output, is central to how the investment has been framed.

"Founded in 1986 as a smallholder enterprise, New Anthoney's Farms Group is proud to enter its next phase of growth through this partnership," said Neil Suraweera, CEO of New Anthoney's Farms Group, of the IFC deal. "This collaboration represents a paradigm shift for us, reinforcing our commitment to world class governance, transparency and operational excellence, while upholding the highest standards of social and environmental sustainability."

Sustainability as a Selling Point, Not a Cost

That same commitment carried through to Chicago. Sri Lankan representatives at Soy Connext joined one of the summit's sustainability panels, where the conversation centred on a message the industry has been slow to fully embrace: that sustainability and profitability are not competing goals. Producers spoke about the commercial gains that follow from sustainable sourcing, and about the Sustainable U.S. Soy logo as a way of making that commitment visible to consumers directly, rather than leaving it buried in a supply chain few ever see.

A Year Stacked With Milestones

The recognition in Chicago also arrives in a year already full of milestones for the company. 2026 marks New Anthoney's Farms' 40th anniversary, a moment the company marked with its third consecutive appearance at the Healthy Living Expo in Colombo, held as part of the Medicare international healthcare exhibition. "As we marked 40 years of giving the healthiest, nutritional and safest chicken to Sri Lankan families, our return to the Healthy Living Expo was both a celebration and a reaffirmation," Suraweera said at the time. The company was also named Best Exporter in the Processed Food Category at the 26th Presidential Export Awards, organised by the Sri Lanka Export Development Board, and finished as first runner up for Best Stall in the Food and Beverage category at ProFood ProPack, one of the country's leading food industry exhibitions.

What the Recognition Signals

Taken together, the year reads less like a series of unconnected wins and more like the natural output of a strategy the company has held to for four decades: build trust with consumers first, and let recognition follow. What has changed is the scale of the stage. A company that started out selling chicken to smallholder markets in Sri Lanka now finds itself cited by an American trade body as a model for sustainable sourcing, backed by one of the world's largest development finance institutions, and standing in the same room as sustainability leaders from three continents.

For Sri Lanka's wider poultry and agribusiness sector, that visibility matters beyond one company's growth story. It signals that a small, import dependent island economy can produce a business capable of setting standards rather than simply following them, and that the food safety commitments Sri Lankan consumers increasingly expect at home are the same ones being recognised on a global stage.