‘Backward integration, most sustainable option for industrial growth’
05 March 2021 |
4:11 am
The Director of External Relations, Promasidor Nigeria Limited, Andrew Enahoro, yesterday, said the company’s backward integration programme is an inclusive and sustainable...
The Director of External Relations, Promasidor Nigeria Limited, Andrew Enahoro, yesterday, said the company’s backward integration programme is an inclusive and sustainable “journey” the firm has taken to support national economic development.
Considering importation logistics challenges and the need to increase local capacity ulitisation, he said backward integration, an option that rationalizes local input sourcing, is the way to go in the country’s quest for industrial revival.
Enahoro said this during an interaction with the journalists where he spoke extensively on the company’s partnership with Ekiti State Government leading to the birth of Ikun Dairy Farm Limited, which recently imported pregnant Jersey cows to support local milk production.
Enahoro said the Jersey cow importation programme, which will see the company bring in a total of 500 animals into the country, is not a flash in the pan but part of the company’s sustainable backward integration roadmap that runs across its manufacturing complex.
The director said the cows would be imported in sets (with other batches expected to arrive in the country in the second week of April and August) to ensure that milk is produced from the farm “all-year-round”. He said the cows were initially planned for two shipments but that COVID-19 vaccine distribution distorted that option.
According to him, the Jersey breed option was a product of long years of research and experimentation on how the company could produce its milk inputs locally. He said the company had made huge losses previously before opting for the breed from the United States.
Enahoro said other breeds, such as the Netherlands, were considered but that the company settled for Jersey breed for its considerably high yield and ability to survive the climatic condition of Nigeria. The Netherlands, he said, produces much higher but “can only survive in a cold environment”.
He stated that the company has taken a tough option to ensure that “not one of its employees is sacked on the ground of COVID-19”, which he admitted would have a significant impact on the company’s bottom line.
For him, the choice to retain the manufacturing giant’s payroll, despite the downturn stems from an “economic sentiment” rather than a business decision.
“We had to do a lot of business reorgnising and re-engineering to survive COVID-19, which has been tough,” he said, foreclosing the sacking option.
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