Stan McCarthy quietly stepped down as chief executive of Kerry Group at the end of September. He leaves with the two members of the Kerry family, the plc and the co-op, far apart and with significant issues to tackle.

On the face of it, he has engineered a smooth transition in the company he has led for almost a decade. His replacement, Edmond Scanlon, is steeped in the Kerry way, being from the county and having joined the graduate programme over 20 years ago.

Share price quadrupled during McCarthy’s tenure and currently stands at an all-time high of €82.60. It is still by far the biggest Irish food company, worth €14.5bn.

And yet serious questions exist for the milk suppliers who founded Kerry in the first place.

McCarthy’s relationship with shareholders and the co-op board broke down steadily over the years, until he finally quit the co-op board, which had always shared its CEO with the plc, in May 2016.

The main battleground, inevitably, was milk price. In 2011, a commitment was made that Kerry would lead on milk price, but there was disagreement over whether the pledge was to pay “a leading milk price” or “the leading milk price”. Farmers say it failed to deliver on either.

The solution? A “13th payment” to fill the gap. Arbitration over the 2015 payment is still ongoing, with 2016 also outstanding.

Then there is the patronage shares issue. Revenue’s case could hit farmers for up to €50,000. Some blame Kerry management for maintaining the practice right up until quotas ended; some blame the co-op board.

The co-op itself still has not replaced McCarthy after 18 months, leaving a group of farmers managing the 13.7% of plc shares retained in the co-op – worth a cool €2bn. The co-op owns no other physical assets, but does have an option to buy certain assets of Kerry Group’s Irish agribusiness division, which operates the animal feed mill and milk processing assets. This option was agreed in 2002 but lapses in 2020.

A vocal minority have been calling for the dissolution of the co-op and the wealth to be shared out pro rata.

The selection of a new co-op CEO and the relationship developed with Edmond Scanlon will be key in determining if the serious issues that exist are resolved. We wish all well.