The National Nucleus Project of Rubber Plantation and Processing (NNPRPP) submitted a proposal to the Privatisation and Public Enterprises Supervision Agency (PPESA) to be reformed as an enterprise two weeks ago.
The agency asked for the proposal to be amended in a written reply made three days after the proposal’s submission, according to Million Worku, general manger of the NPRPP.
“One of the agency’s requests was to list the project’s capital, including the physical assets as well as money in the bank,” he told Fortune.
The proposal’s submission was confirmed by sources at the PPESA, who requested anonymity because they were not authorised to officially comment.
The project, which was previously under the Addis Tyre Factory, was initiated as a test project for the plantation of rubber trees on 10ht of land. However, Matador, the company which bought Addis Tyre through a joint venture (JV) in 2004, rejected the project and it was put under the supervision of the PPESA.
“The project’s capital was registered as 333 million Br at the time it was put under the PPESA,” Million told Fortune. “The proposal submitted to the agency includes the organisational structure of the enterprise to be formed, job descriptions, and plans for future expansion.”
Since being under the supervision of the agency, the project has been granted an additional 2,000ht plot in Bench Magi Zone, Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples (SNNP) Regional State, where the previous plot is located.
Under the project, which has 100 employees, rubber trees have been planted on 1,438ht in addition to the previous 10ht bringing the total trees to 5,000, according to Million.
A rubber plant takes five to six years to begin producing the latex used to make rubber and can last up to 30 years.
“The project does not only want to concentrate on planting trees, but aims to install its own factory as well,” Million told Fortune. “We had a discussion with the Metal and Engineering Corporation (MetEC) for them to install the factory and we have visited factory sites in Côte d’Ivoire. It was agreed that it would be possible to install it using local resources.”
The project has been producing 1.8tn of latex from 10ht per month while the market demands 10,000tn annually, according to the general manager of the project, who added that most of the rubber used in Ethiopia is imported from Malaysia, Indonesia, and Thailand.
“The international price for a kilogramme of rubber is 60.2 Br, which is equal to the local price,” Million said. “The price of imported rubber increases significantly when transportation tax and duties are added to it.”
(Source: http://addisfortune.com/Rubber%20Project%20Requests%20Upgrade%20to%20Enterprise.htm)
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