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KEOKUK, IOWA -- UPDATED: The following is a Press Release issued by Roquette America, Inc. issued on December 17:

On Monday and Tuesday of this week, representatives of Roquette America and the BCTGM Local 48G met again in an attempt to resolve the labor dispute that is now in its third month. Unfortunately, no progress was made on any of the major issues. On Tuesday, December 14, the Company provided the union negotiating team with a revised "Last, Best and Final" offer in a good faith attempt to resolve the labor dispute in order that the union members families can celebrate the holidays knowing they are going back to work.

The Company encourages the union leadership to allow the bargaining unit member employees of Roquette America to vote on the Company's newest offer. To facilitate this, the Company has had printed 240 copies of the contract proposal for the union leadership to distribute to its union membership.  The Company also urges its employees to speak to their union representatives to voice their opinion on this matter.

“Earlier this week we gave each member of the union negotiating team a copy of the Company’s latest proposal” said Tom Ross, Human Resources Director and Roquette America’s chief negotiator. “We would like the union members to review the proposal and decide for themselves.  We are facilitating the process for the union leaders so they can distribute the copies to the membership.  If members choose to ratify the contract they can end the lockout.”

Roquette America hopes that the union will allow the employees to vote on whether to accept the Company's December 14th offer and end this lock out prior to Christmas.   Roquette America is hopeful that the union body will ratify it and efforts can turn to getting people back to work prior to Christmas.

If the union members ratify the current contract proposal, the Company and the union negotiating committee can use the next scheduled meeting (December 28) to work out the details for bringing the employees back to work.

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The following is a statement from Roquette America received Tuesday, Dec. 14 at 7:11 p.m.

Roquette America would like to share the following statement concerning the December 13 & 14 negotiation sessions with BCTGM Local 48G:

Two additional days of negotiation sessions between Roquette America and BCTGM Local 48G have just been completed, and both parties traded new proposals. Roquette continues to try to move the negotiations along agreeing to some of the union’s concepts contained in their latest proposal submitted on December 13.  However, the Company is disappointed that the union’s proposal made very little movement and did not substantially addressed Roquette’s six core negotiation goals. 

On December 14, Roquette provided each member of the union’s negotiating team a full printed copy of the Company’s most recent comprehensive contract proposal. Once again the Company encouraged the union leadership to submit the proposal to the members of Local 48G for a ratification vote so we can get our employees back to work.