AFRICA news
Ohorongo Cement has held a ground-breaking ceremony for a 5MW
solar plant at its Sargberg cement plant in North Otavi, Namibia .
The site is being developed and built by Germany’s SunEQ and its
local partner Hungileni, and construction of the plant will start once
SunEQ has obtained a generation license from the Electricity Control
Board. The USD7.8-million project is scheduled to start operation
by the end of 2017. “Electricity is of paramount importance to our
operations and constitutes 25% of our production requirements.
We are aware of the country’s precarious energy situation and
hence took the decision to tap into the renewable energy resource
which our country is endowed with,” says Hans-Wilhelm Schutte,
Ohorongo Cement’s managing director.
Dangote Cement has increased its production capacity across Africa
through the addition of a 1.5 million metric tonnes per annum plant
in the Republic of the Congo , according to a report in Vanguard.
The newly completed manufacturing plant is located at Mfila on
the outskirts of Brazzaville. According to Ganapathy Bala, Dangote’s
director of operations for Congo SA, Dangote is the latest entrant into
the cement industry in Congo and has invested USD350-million. Before
Dangote’s entry into the market, the Congolese cement industry was
dominated by Cimaf, Sonocc and Forspal, with a combined capacity of
1.05 million metric tonnes. Work on the project started in 2014, and the
first batch of 42.5 R grade of cement from the plant is expected to be
delivered by July 2017.
Afrimat has released its
financial results for the year
ended 28 February 2017.
Andries van Heerden, CEO
of Afrimat, ascribes the
continuing improvement
in results to the group’s
diversification strategy as well
as cost reduction and efficiency
improvement initiatives.
Afrimat operates across two
main segments – aggregates
and industrial minerals and
concrete-based products – which
contributed R1.6-billion and
R674.9-million, respectively, to
group revenue.
A strong performance from the
mineral producing operations
across all regions contributed
to an increase of 25.4% in
headline earnings per share to
196.4c (from 156.6c). The group
was successful in increasing
its operating margin to 18.2%
(from 16.3%) and improving
cash generated from
operations to R406-million
(from R320.3-million) through
the efficiency improvement drive.
Revenue increased by
13.1% to R2.2-billion (from
R1.9-billion) the previous year.
Excluding the contribution of
Afrimat’s financial
results stronger
Afrimat CEO, Andries van
Heerden.
acquisitions, revenue increased
by 5.5%, while volumes remained
flat. Afrimat maintained its
dividend policy at 2.75x dividend
cover and declared a final
dividend of 50c per share (2016:
41c) for the year.
Van Heerden says an
improved contribution from
the traditional aggregates
businesses primarily in the
Western Cape, supported the
satisfactory results of the
aggregates and industrial
minerals segment, while the
concrete-based products
segment was impacted by
difficult market conditions.
QUARRY SA | JULY 2017 _ 7