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Oliver Kazunga, Senior Business Reporter
THE infrastructural development projects that Government continues to implement are driving Pretoria Portland Cement (PPC) Zimbabwe business in the country, the firm’s managing director Mr Kelibone Masiyane, has said.

Under the Second Republic, which came into being in November 2017, Government has among other fundamentals, prioritised infrastructural development to promote economic growth and development in line with Vision 2030, where an upper middle-income economy status is targeted.

Over the years, the Second Republic embarked on various infrastructural development projects that include Kariba South Hydropower Station expansion project, US$1,4 billion Hwange Thermal Power Expansion project, the Lake Gwayi-Shangani investment.

Moreso, other massive infrastructural development projects such as the Bulawayo-Beitbridge highway rehabilitation project are on the cards.

In a recent interview, Mr Masiyane said his organisation supports 80 percent of the national infrastructural development programmes.

However, he could not be drawn into ascertaining their sales figures as he did not have the figures off hand.

“I can’t give you the tonnes off hand but what I can tell you is we support 80 percent of national projects in the country.

“In some instances, obviously, its due to the fact that we have a varied product portfolio that no one in the country can match so there are certain cements that we make other manufacturers can’t make.

“When you look at the national projects, even the Kariba South Power plant expansion, the type of cement that is required there can only be made by PPC,” said Mr Masiyane.

“We are quite dominant in the projects space and we actually do see even going forward, quite a number of projects, some confirmed, some still yet to be confirmed.

But that whole infrastructural development drive is essentially what’s really pushing us and we’re quite excited, we actually see the market in Zimbabwe growing and it’s been growing quite exponentially and its really exciting for us.”

Mr Masiyane believes his organisation is producing enough cement for the local market and this is complemented by competition from other domestic cement manufacturers.

PPC operates a clinker plant in Collen Bawn, which produces clinker, a major raw material that is used to produce cement.

The company has two cement production plants in Bulawayo and Harare both the factories have the capacity to produce 700 000 tonnes annually apiece.

“As PPC we can do 1,4 million tonnes annually and demand, is roughly around 1,3 million tonnes annually.

So, just PPC alone has enough capacity to supply the whole of Zimbabwe, but obviously there is competition as well; we have got Lafarge, Sino, Livetouch and Pakstar who are the other players.

“I think competition must be encouraged so there is enough from that cake for even competition as well, but as you know PPC remains the dominant company in the cement industry,” he said.

In June 2020, PPC launched a new product range with a view to address the challenges of cheap and suboptimal cement imports that were flooding the domestic market.

The PPC product range, which is called SURERANGE comprises six cement types that are Surewall, Surebuild, Surecem, Surecast, Sureroad and Suretech.

The products are part of the firm’s threefold strategy aimed at caring for the customer, and caring for the environment and to be the cement industry’s technology leader.

“All our products are selling very well but obviously they serve a specific purpose or function.

The SURERANGE launch that you are talking about, we were moving from a scenario where people talk about 22,5 and 32,5 in terms of strength classes as opposed to function.

“So, when we moved from the strength categorisation of our products to SURERANGE emphasizing the purpose or function of each and every different product so that anybody can understand if they say they want to plaster a wall, then they know what product to use.

“If you want cement for general purpose building, you will have to go for Surecem and for early strength development, obviously we have got Surecast which is a favourite for these concrete product manufacturers,” said Mr Masiyane.

As a market leader, he said his organisation through SURERANGE, has eliminated the confusion that existed in the past where people did not know what a particular type of cement is used for.

“We are not in the business of just selling cement, but we are coming with solutions.

We consider ourselves to be a solutions provider, we do provide technical services in terms of support if people want to understand more about our product and usage especially when you are dealing with sophisticated users,” said Mr Masiyane.

— @KazungaOliver