Tag Archives: industrials

Chinese and European investors to buy Tajik fertiliser

JULY 28 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Tajik government said that Chinese and European investors have shown interest in buying TojikAzot, a debt-ridden fertiliser plant in the southern province of Khatlon. TojikAzot stopped operations in 2008 when it halted gas imports from Uzbekistan. The company was privatised in 2002, when Ukrainian businessman Dmytro Firtash bought a 75% share in the company. Mr Firtash was later accused of illegally buying the plant and a local court invalidated the privatisation in 2014.

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(News report from Issue No. 291, published on Aug. 1 2016)

Tajikistan’s aluminum smelter increases production

JULY 21 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikistan’s state-owned aluminium smelter TALCO said it produced 73,100 tonnes of aluminium in H1 2016, a 13% increase over the same period last year. Low commodity prices, though, meant it sold aluminium at a price range of $1,400-$1,600/tonne. Production costs have reached $2,000/tonne.

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(News report from Issue No. 290, published on July 22 2016)

Azerbaijan to launch ferrosilicon plant

JUNE 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s state-owned Baku Non-Ferrous Metals & Ferroalloys Company said it will launch in 2017 a new plant for the production of ferrosilicon and ferrosilicon manganese, two ferroalloys used in the heavy industry. The plant will be located at the Sumgayit Chemical Industrial Park outside of Baku.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Lubricant plant opens in Kazakhstan

MAY 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Russian energy company Lukoil said it had started construction work on a new lubricant manufacturing plant in Kazakhstan. Lubricants Central Asia, Lukoil’s subsidiary which will operate the plant, plans to open the plant in 2018. Kazakhstan and China will be the main markets for the plant, which will have a capacity of 100,000 tonnes/year. Kazakhstan wants to develop industries beyond oil and gas production and mining.

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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)

Armenian to re-consider cement deal

MAY 12 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Armenian government re-submitted a bill to parliament to write- off part of the Hradzan cement plant’s debt, in an attempt to save the company from bankruptcy. Last month, parliament rejected an earlier bill designed to pardon 510m dram ($1.1m) that the company owes in unpaid tax.

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(News report from Issue No. 280, published on May 13 2016)

Armenia’ parliament rejects cement plant debt

APRIL 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s parliament rejected a bill to write-off part of the Hradzan cement plant’s debt, casting doubts on the company’s survival. The bill was designed to pardon 510m dram ($1.1) in overdue taxes. Last year VTB Bank Armenia took control of the plant. The plant’s total debt is estimated at 935m drams ($1.9m).

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(News report from Issue No. 278, published on April 29 2016)

Georgian businessman plans $100m cement plant

APRIL 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgian businessman Cezar Chocheli will enter a joint venture with an unnamed Chinese company to build a $100m cement plant in Senaki, around 250km west of Tbilisi. The new factory, will employ around 500 people. Investors expect construction to begin in June.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Industrial production falls in Kyrgyzstan

APRIL 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s industrial production fell by 25.7% to 39.5b som, mainly due to a slump in the mining sector, the Statistics Committee said in a report. The figures reflect the 4.9% GDP decline the Committee posted last week. Without accounting for Kumtor, Kyrgyzstan’s largest gold project, industrial output would have declined by 1%.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Tajikistan’s TALCO lays off 607 workers

DUSHANBE, APRIL 18 2016, (The Conway Bulletin) — Central Asia’s largest aluminium smelter, TALCO, laid off 607 workers to cut costs, an indication of how a heavy fall in global commodity prices has hit industry in Tajikistan.

TALCO is Tajikistan’s largest factory, its biggest taxpayer and its biggest consumer of electricity. It dominates the Tajik economy so for it to lay off 607 workers cuts deep into the national conscience. TALCO now employs 8,200 workers.

According to a report by the Reuters news agency, foreign consultants had advised the company to cut around 2,000 workers from the workforce to maintain a healthy balance sheet.

The company, however, chose what it described as a “a gentle strategy to optimise costs”.

Aluminium prices, now at $1,530/tonne, are around 25% lower than in August 2014.

Besides having to cope with lower revenues, TALCO is also under the spotlight for unpaid electricity bills to the national distributor Barqi Tojik and is the focus of a parliamentary investigation in Norway over alleged corrupt practices.

The Norwegian investigation involves Norsk Hydro, a government- owned smelter that has done business with TALCO.

Norway’s MPs want to know who the beneficial owner of Talco Management, registered in the British Virgin Islands, is. Talco management controls TALCO in Tajikistan.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Unpaid gas bill pressures glass factory in Kyrgyzstan

BISHKEK, APRIL 6 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A row over gas debt repayment has shown just how indebted some Kyrgyz companies have become as the entire Central Asia region battles with a deepening economic downturn.

Interglass, which had employed up to 600 people in Tomok in northern Kyrgyzstan, now owes the Kyrgyz subsidiary of Russia’s Gazprom over 1.1b som, or around $16m, for unpaid gas. This is half Gazprom Kyrgyzstan’s total outstanding debt it is owed by its Kyrgyz customers.

Four years ago, Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev had toured Interglass and held it up as an example of Kyrgyz regional enterprise. Now Interglass is struggling to stave off bankruptcy.

Gazprom Kyrgyzstan said that it has tried to negotiate with the glass- making company so that it can pay back its debt in a structured manner but that negotiations had collapsed.

“Taking into account the social importance of the enterprise, in March Gazprom Kyrgyzstan gave Interglass in every opportunity to settle the debt for the supplied gas,” it said in a statement.

It has previously called on the Kyrgyz government to step in to help Interglass pay off its debts and also threatened to turn off the gas to the whole of Kyrgyzstan if it doesn’t pay.

There has been no comment from Interglass or its parent company, the Germany-registered but Bishkek based, Steinert Industries.

For the Kyrgyz government, the row creates a potentially incendiary scenario. It sold off its gas distribu- tion network to Gazprom for a sym- bolic $1 in 2014 in exchange for settling its debt and agreeing to fund much needed investment. It has just renegotiated a cheaper price of gas for ordinary customers but businesses still complain that in the current economic climate Gazprom Kyrgyzstan is overcharging.

The government has said it will step in to help Interglass pay its bill but, so far, there has been little evidence to show that it has achieved any major inroads.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)