Zimpapers Logo

Oliver Kazunga, Senior Business Reporter
STEEL engineering company, Steelforce Holdings, is working on improving its operational capacity on the back of the envisaged rebound of the construction industry and massive economic transformation, an official said.

Briefing Industry and Commerce Deputy Minister Raj Modi who was accompanied by officials from his ministry during a tour of the company last week, the company’s group operations manager Mr Les Evans said growth in the construction industry presents a huge opportunity for them.

“The construction industry at the moment is on the mend and we have been very fortunate and been quite busy in selling certain products. All of our products are to do with the construction industry going into any form of concrete works,” he said.

“At the moment we have to import our raw materials and we have to convert them and add value and obviously sell them into the local market.”

Steelforce manufactures products such as reinforcing steel, deformed bar, round bar, weld-mesh, brick-force, gabions, hard drawn wire, annealed (baling) wire, and razor wire. Mr Evans said the closure of Zisco negatively impacted on their operations.

“As we have discussed before, we would like to see Zisco coming up and obviously we will be able to get our product (raw materials) locally where we used to.

“This company used to take 20 percent of Zisco’s monthly production and enabling us to export to neighbouring countries such as Botswana and Zambia and we were very busy in the export market at that time,” he said.

The Redcliff-based steel manufacturing company, Zisco, ceased operations at the height of economic challenges in 2008. Efforts to resuscitate operations at Zisco are underway after the Government last year signed a $1 billion investment with a Chinese firm, R and F.

“We are operating at about 30 percent capacity at the moment, obviously if business picks up we would like to grow the business as well if the construction and infrastructure projects put on the go, which obviously, we are all hoping for and we are very proud to be part of the whole process,” said Mr Evans.

He told Deputy Minister Modi that due to the prevailing foreign currency shortage, his company has not been spared.

“Like any other company, we do have our issues and I think the major issue at the moment is forex and we can overcome those but it is a major problem to pay for our raw materials,” said Mr Evans.

The engineering company, which at the moment employs 150 people in Bulawayo and Harare, is importing raw materials such as wire rod from South Africa. In an interview after the tour, Mr Evans said his firm was producing between 300 tonnes and 400 tonnes a month of its products.

“We have the capacity to do 2 000 if the work was there and we would employ up to 300 people at the Bulawayo factory.

“At the moment we are supplying the local market within the constructing industry, anything pertaining to construction domestic and big infrastructure projects such as those for the mining sector,” he said.

Mr Evans said they were upgrading their plant in Bulawayo to add new products on their production list to grow the company at a later stage.

“If the economy improves, we are definitely looking at improving our operations and we have got the potential of employing between 300 and 400 people,” he said. — @okazunga