Africa-Press – Tanzania. TWIGA Cement has expressed its intention to invest 15 million USD to renovate and expand its factory for the year 2021.
This was revealed by the Factory Senior Commercial Manager, Danford Semwenda, when speaking to the Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC), a delegation that visited the factory Friday.
The delegation visited the factory to witness the operations and to hear challenges facing the factory so that the government could work on them to enable smooth operations of the factory.
Semwenda said one of the challenges they face most is the delay of their cargo at Dar es Salaam port where they stay there for a very long time and at the end of the day they are charged with big penalties.
“The investment that is done here is huge so we need people like TIC to visit us regularly so that they can hear our challenges and today we are very happy that they are here and they will take all our problems to the government, your visit is a clear testimony of the readiness to cooperate with investors,” he said.
Semwenda said the factory pays the government about 54bn/- annually as taxes and other charges and has contributed many employment opportunities to the citizens.
Semwenda said during the 5th phase government they did good business by supplying tonnes of cement to the construction of strategic infrastructure like construction of Standard Gauge Railways (SGR), Ubungo Interchange the construction of Rufiji Hydro Power Plant Project to mention a few.
Bevin Ngenzi, who is TIC Eastern Zone Manager, said they decided to visit the factory to witness the operations and see if there are any challenges that need immediate attention.
He said TIC is happy to see how the factory expands from time to time, something which increases government revenues through taxes collection and other charges.
He said for the past 10 years, the factory was producing 1.2 million tonnes of cement annually but currently they have increased their capacity to about two million tonnes annually.
“Twiga cement is doing well and we are happy for that, they have also thanked the government for better business environment despite the fact that there are small policy challenges which we are going to work on it in collaboration with responsible institutions,” he said.
He said the investor has expressed concern of cargo delays at Dar es Salaam port promising that they are going to solve it to enable smooth operations of the factory.
He said TIC is there to make sure all investors are happy with the working environment and solve their problems whenever it arises.
