Nigeria: Lafarge Africa complains of inadequate gas supply

Management at Lafarge Africa’s plants at Ewekoro and Sagamu, Ogun State, have voiced their concerns over the inadequate gas supply to their operations. Production managers at the two plants, Segun Shoyoye and Hannes Diedericks, disclosed that their plants had to cease production for the past six weeks over the matter.

Mr Shoyoye said, "The twin problems of non-availability of gas and foreign exchange are impeding full capacity production in the manufacturing industry. We can say we have some challenges, but the major issue is lack of gas supply because of the blowing up of oil and gas pipelines by militants in the Niger Delta region. We are now using a mixture of gas and black oil for our operations, which is highly costly, and also down rates our production from 100 per cent to 75 percent in the Ewekoro plant. This has been on since February.

"During the month of May, we had to stop production in the Sagamu plant for six weeks. Before then, we had been producing 3,000 tonnes per day, but now, we are doing about 1,000 tonnes per day because of the fuel issue. But, I want to say that we will soon get over it because of our investment in alternative source of energy in our plants," he went on to add.

According to Mr Shoyoye and Mr Diedericks, the situation began six months ago and has forced the plants to achieve production rates far below capacity and at times caused closures. Statements were made following an inspection by officials from the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), led by Acting Director-General, Paul Angya.