Progress on this goal in 2013 include the American Pride  Acquisition in the fourth quarter (see Section 5.1 of this MD&A for  more information); however, due to slowed progress on our “supply  chain excellence” goal as explained above and current headwinds  on our U.S. food service business (discussed in detail under the  “Performance” section of this MD&A), we are not confident we can  achieve this level of Adjusted EBITDA by the end of 2015, and are  extending this goal by another year, to the end of 2016. We have a talented team of people with High Liner Foods that have considerable experience and work together well as a team.  Nevertheless, we are planning ahead for a large number of  retirements expected over the next 10 years, and succession  planning activities are well underway at the senior levels of the  organization. We need to make sure that we both develop and hire  talented people to elevate the organization when vacancies are  created by retirements and we also need to build internal capacity  for integrating the companies that we plan to acquire as part of our growth strategy. In late 2010, we made an ambitious, but important, organizational  commitment to source all of our seafood from “certified sustainable  or responsible” fisheries and aquaculture, and we set out to  accomplish this by the end of 2013. At the beginning of 2010,  approximately 22% of our wild seafood was certified and 75% of our  aquaculture seafood was from Global Aquaculture Alliance Best  Aquaculture Practices (“BAP”) certified facilities. At the end of  2013, we achieved 99% of this goal and through this process, High  Liner Foods has become recognized as a global leader in driving  best practice improvements in wild fisheries and aquaculture. We  will continue to work to achieve the remaining 1% of this goal and  as part of our ongoing commitment to sustainability, will continue  to work on additional opportunities to improve sustainability  across our supply chain, extending beyond the seafood we source. Our strategy was designed with the expectation to increase  shareholder value. To help us maintain a focus on meeting investor  expectations, we have chosen four key financial measures to gage  our performance. We have set these measures based on the  performance achieved by comparable food companies in North  America. These measures are: Our Corporate Strategic Goals for 2014 are: As explained above, we did not make as much progress towards  the goal in 2013 as expected due to the challenges in our U.S. plant  consolidation. Nevertheless, this remains a major opportunity. Our  company has quadrupled in size over the past six years. We now  operate on a scale that is far larger than many of our competitors  and we need to take advantage of this scale to improve our quality  and service and reduce costs. As explained above, challenges encountered in 2013 will make it difficult to achieve this target by the end of 2015 and we have  extended it by a year, to the end of 2016. We continue to believe this goal is achievable through a combination of supply chain  excellence, internal growth and acquisition. In addition to  integrating the American Pride Acquisition in 2014, to achieve  $150 million in Adjusted EBITDA, we believe we need to  successfully complete the integration of one major or two smaller  acquisitions, and increase organic growth by the introduction of  innovative new product platforms and market share gains before  the end of 2016. Average assets managed  (calculated using the  average net assets month-end balance for each  of the preceding 13 months, where “net assets  managed” includes all assets, except for  employee future benefits, deferred income taxes  and other certain financial assets, less accounts  payable and provisions). Adjusted EBITDA  as defined under the heading  “Non-IFRS Financial Measures” in the  Introduction section of this MD&A. Each of these financial measures is discussed below. *  Excluding American Pride in 2013 3. Succession Planning  Financial Objectives 3. Sustainability Strategic Goals for 2014 1. Supply Chain Optimization  2. Profitable Growth – $150 million in Adjusted EBITDA  Divided by: Return on assets managed (“ROAM”) is  calculated as follows: ANNUAL REPORT 2013 17 2013  2012  Benchmark Actual Actual Returns On assets managed  15.0%  13.5% 13.2% On equity  18.0%  20.4% 17.6% Profitability Trailing 12-month Adjusted EBIT as a percentage of net sales  8.0%  7.4% 7.9% Financial strength  Net interest-bearing debt  to Adjusted EBITDA ratio (times) 3.0  3.9 3.4 Inventory management  Inventory turns (times)*  4.2 4.3 4.0