UNILEVER HAS IMPROVED MARGINS, VOLUMES IN 1986 Unilever Plc <UN.A> and NV group reported improvements in margins and underlying sales volume growth of five pct in 1986 after stripping out the effects of falling prices, disposals and currency movements, Unilever Plc chairman Michael Angus said. He told reporters that volumes in North America increased some 10.5 pct while European consumer goods rose about 2.5 pct after being flat for some years. Much of the disposal strategy, aimed at concentrating activities on core businesses, had now been completed, he noted. But the process of acquisitions would go on, with strategic acquisitions taking place "from time to time," he said. The company earlier reported a 20 pct rise in pre-tax profits for 1986 to 1.14 billion stg from 953 mln previously. In guilder terms, however, profits at the pre-tax level dropped three pct to 3.69 billion from 3.81 billion. Angus said the recent purchase of Chesebrough-Pond's Inc <CBM.N> for 72.50 dlrs a share was unlikely to bring any earnings dilution. However, it would not add much to profits, with much of the company's operating profits paying for the acquisition costs. Finance director Niall Fitzgerald added that while gearing - debt to equity plus debt - rose to about 60 pct at end 1986 from 35 pct last year, this was expected to drop back to about 40 pct by end-1987. The same divergence was made in full year dividend, with Unilever NV's rising 3.4 pct to 15.33 guilders and Unilever Plc's increasing 29.9 pct to 50.17p, approximately in line with the change in attributable profit. Angus said the prospectus for the sale of parts of Chesebrough was due to be published shortly. However, he said that there was no target date for completing the process. He also declined to say what sort of sum Unilever hoped to realise from the operation, beyond noting that Chesebrough had paid around 1.25 billion dlrs for Stauffer Chemical Co, which operates outside Unilever's core activities. In the U.S., Organic growth from the Lipton Foods business, considerable expansion in the household products business and in margarine had been behind the overall sales increase. However, he noted that the U.S. Household products business had turned in a planned loss, with fourth quarter performance better than expected despite the anticipated heavy launch costs of its Surf detergents.