Mumias Sugar dives into water manufacturing

By James Anyanzwa

Mumias Sugar Company (MSC) Ltd is set to diversify its investments in water manufacturing.

The Western Kenya-based sugar miller is exploring opportunities to set up a water bottling plant to exploit excess water from their power generation plant.

Evaluating tenders

Mr Peter Kebati, the company’s chief finance officer said the company was already evaluating tenders from local and international contractors seeking to set up the plant.

"We are evaluating tenders. We expect to set up the plant in the next six months," Kebati said, adding that the company would sell its water at competitive market prices.

The sugar miller commissioned the power generation project in May this year, increasing its power generation from 12MW to 38MW.

The Sh2.6-billion project, which was funded by a loan from PROPARCO, an international development finance institution, has increased the company’s power supply to the national grid to 26MW from 3MW.

MSC weathered hostile industrial unrests to post a 33 per cent growth in earnings in the last six months ending June 30, 2009.

Its revenues jumped to Sh1.6 billion from Sh1.2 billion in a similar period last year.

During the industrial action by farmers, the company’s sugar production shrunk by 13 per cent to 231, 014 tonnes from 265, 263 tonnes.

Crushing capacity

The company’s crushing capacity also plummeted from 2.2 million tonnes of sugar cane up from 2.4 million tonnes in the same period last year.

The teething problems experienced during the tie-in of the sugar plant with the co-generation power also led to lost production time and lower than anticipated power generation.