88 | Tees Business
A different perspective - SABIC site
director Daren Smith believes Teesside’s
chemical industry should be celebrated.
CHEMICAL
REACTION
By Dave Allan
T
Key message -
SABIC’s Daren Smith.
SABIC chief calls for
industry support in
challenging times
he man at the Teesside helm of one
of the world’s leading petrochemical
businesses has sprung to the
defence of the industry he loves.
As site director of Teesside-based
SABIC UK Petrochemicals, part of one of
the world’s largest chemical companies,
Daren Smith knows more than most
that these are challenging times for the
petrochemicals and plastics sector.
On a national and local level, the
growing public campaign against
plastic has been heightened by David
Attenborough’s Blue Planet documentaries
focusing on the environmental damage
being caused by plastic waste around the
world.
But Daren is leading the fight to focus
on an antidote to the negatives – and
insists it is a battle that must be won to
protect the future of a chemical industry
that remains indelibly linked with Teesside
and its people.
While its size has reduced in recent
decades, the chemicals and plastics
sector remain a key part of the Teesside
economy. It is home to the largest single
cluster of process, chemicals and energy
companies anywhere in the UK, and the
second largest in the whole of Europe.
The chemicals and process industry
directly employs 7,500 people locally and
many, many more through the local supply
chain. It is estimated that 32,000 jobs
in Tees Valley’s downstream chemical-
using industries – including healthcare,
electronics, automotive and textiles – rely
on the continued success of the industry.
SABIC itself employs more than 540
highly skilled people across its Wilton and
North Tees sites along with 400 contractors,
creating an estimated £400m for the local
economy through payroll, goods, services
and utilities.
Along with a number of other prominent
Teesside businesses, SABIC manufactures
chemicals that form the building blocks for a
range of plastic products that we all use in
everyday life.
In the automotive sector, SABIC-