Consolidation needed in South African market claims PPC chief

Darryll Castle, chief executive of PPC, has said that he believes there are too many cement companies operating in South Africa, adding that necessary consolidation would leave his firm in a stronger position, the Zimbabwe Herald reports.

Mr Castle told the newspaper that PPC was “keeping and eye on the whole industry” and refused to comment on claims that merger talks had been reopened between his firm and the AfriSam Group.

“In the longer term, there’s no doubt that there needs to be some kind of consolidation in the industry, and you can be sure that as PPC it would benefit us because we are the big player”, Mr Castle said.

AfriSam and PPC abandoned talks on a merger two years ago. Sources have recently suggested that these had been resumed, and are likely to be supported by AfriSam’s controlling shareholder, the Public Investment Corporation.