From: Biniam Haile \(SWE\) (eritrea.lave@comhem.se)
Date: Mon Oct 20 2008 - 16:42:48 EDT
Margran Factory Looks for International Markets
Efrem Habtetsion, Oct 21, 2008
Margran is a company that is involved in the marble and granite
processing works in Eritrea. The company owns marble and granite mining
deposits in Goyne, Geleb, Tsemamt, Tkuel and other areas that supply raw
materials for its Marble and Granite Factory located in Ghendae.
The Company started its work with five old machines dating back to
Italian colonialism. In 1993, however, it was upgraded to an advanced
level. The Company established Ghendae Marble and Granite Factory in
1995.
"The Factory is well equipped and produces different colored and shaped
marble and granite products. Eritrea is endowed with ample resources in
this regard and the Government is exerting maximum effort to enable our
people benefit from such resources," said Mr. Mehari Teklemariam,
manager of the Factory.
The marble and granite deposits in Eritrea are substantial: in quality,
color and quantity. When it is fully exploited, it would attract
international interest. The marble and granite resources are widely
distributed in the country, and mainly in the Gash Barka and Debub
regions.
Ghendae Marble and Granite Factory has created job opportunity for more
than 90 people. There are also members of the Warsay-Yekealo who are
assigned there and technicians who run the sophisticated machineries.
The Factory is expected to play a significant role in bringing hard
currency. In order to increase its production capacity, Margran will
introduce more advanced machineries and will also train its
professionals to keep them abreast to the newly introduced machines.
"Our main objective is to develop our human resource. Since it is
difficult to achieve the desired goal without having enough skilled
manpower, providing up-to-date training is our priority concern. We need
people who run the modern machinery and we need to increase production.
So, developing human resource is on the top of our priorities," Mr.
Mehari said.
The Factory has so far given different types of trainings to its workers
and it plans to provide every worker with short term trainings twice
every year. The Factory, other than receiving a little maintenance
assistance from national companies, fulfills every required work by
itself. The entire raw material demand of the Factory is locally
available.
Although the main production of the Factory is marble and granite at the
present, it has also been producing flour tiles with limited capacity
since its foundation. At present, however, the Factory has increased its
flour tiles production after the needed machinery was imported. Margran
also supplies its clients with ceramic tiles.
The Factory is located far away from the source of raw materials and
that makes it difficult to transport blocks of marble and granite from
those areas to Ghendae. "First of all the Factory is export-oriented.
So, it has to be located somewhere near the port and since marble and
granite factory consumes a lot of water, it has to be located in areas
with rich water resource," the manager said.
Margran Marble and Granite Factory has saved a large amount of money
that would have been spent in importing different construction
materials. It also enabled Eritreans to exploit their resources by
themselves and to export competitive products. Although the export rate
has been limited, researches have been conducted to increase export rate
as of this year.
The Factory can crash and process more than 100 blocks of granite and
marble in a month. If the supply of raw materials increased, the Factory
could boost its production. When the Ghendae Marble and Granite Factory
goes fully operational, the export goals for 2008/09 would be reached.
The product of the Factory is expected to be more competitive and to
attract international demand especially from Turkey, Dubai and Italy.
Besides hiring skilled manpower and keeping them up-to-date, the Factory
provides 100% life insurance to its workers and is striving for
efficient administration and better production for both domestic and
international markets.
Source: Hadas Eritrea
http://www.shaebia.org/artman/publish/article_5671.shtml
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