SAB invests R2,8 billion in brewery expansions, boosts job creation

 The expansions include a new packaging line for returnable glass bottles at both breweries and a brewhouse at Rosslyn, and will create up to 70 additional full time jobs.

 
The multi-billion rand investment is over and above the Public Interest Commitments made by Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB-InBev) at the time of last year’s business combination with SABMiller, in which the company agreed to invest R1-billion in South Africa over five years.
 
“This investment will empower our employees to do what they do best – brewing the best quality beer, innovating and ensuring that we do so in a way that will drive sustainable growth.”
 
Mduduzi Mbada, Special Advisor to the Gauteng Premier, welcomed the investment in the Gauteng region.
 
Lionel October, Director-General of the Department of Trade and Industry, said the investment is a welcome boost to the economy in terms of job creation, government’s efforts to promote industrialisation and overall investor confidence. Additional spinoffs are transfer of technology and skills development.
 
Each brewery has received a new 45 000 bottle per hour packaging line for returnable glass bottles, adding a total of four million hectolitres of capacity per year. The equipment, ordered in December 2016, has taken six months to build in Germany. The packaging lines can produce 660ml and 750ml bottles.
 
Each plant will take South African construction workers, civil engineers and equipment installers several months to install and once completed will take up 4 500 square metres. In addition to having 400 workers per site at the peak of each construction, four million new plastic crates and 48-million locally produced new returnable glass bottles have been ordered by SAB.
 
Chairman of AB InBev and SAB, Jabu Mabuza, was optimistic about the investment increasing confidence and thereby growing the economy.
 
The Alrode packaging line will be in production by August while Rosslyn’s will be online by October 2017.
The expansions at both breweries will create additional job opportunities.
 
The project cost for Alrode Brewery, including the packaging equipment and building works, was more than R1,3-billion, while the Rosslyn expansion, which also includes a new brewhouse, cost R1,5-billion.
 
In addition to this investment, a new greenfield malting plant was recently built at Alrode Brewery at a cost of R1,2-billion, expanding malting capacity by 110 0000 tonnes of malt to 150 000 tonnes of malt produced a year. Previously, SAB would import 60% of its malt requirements and the new plant has decreased this figure to close to 0%. The new maltings plant has seen an additional 28 new jobs created.

Posted on : 12 Jul,2017

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