The company said it targets to hit a capacity utilization of 55 per cent by 2018-19 and scale up to 100 per cent by 2020-21. Greenply Industries is investing four million euros to scale up the manufacturing capacity at Gabonese Republic (Gabon) in West Africa.
The Gabon veneer manufacturing facility, which was set up with an initial investment of 11 million euros and has a annual processing capacity of 96000 cubic meters (cbm) of Okoume timber, will get the fresh infusion to scale up its processing capacity from 3,000 cbm per month to 8,000 cbm by March 2019, a company release stated. The facility, located at the NKOK Special Economic Zone, manufactures Okoume face veneers with thickness ranging from 0.2mm and upwards.
“We are constantly working on capacity building and securing resource availability. The company plans to scale up its processing capacity with an additional investment outlay to the tune of 4 million euros,” said Mr. Rajesh Mittal, Managing Director, Greenply Industries. The company, commanding a 26 % market share in the organised plywood market of India, hopes to utilise 55% of its total capacity by the end of this financial year and 100 % utilisation by 2020-21 fiscal.
Okoume timber is considered to be a sustainable and economical solution to restore the ecological imbalance created by widespread deforestation of Gurjan trees, which forms the primary source for face veneers of the Indian plywood industry. Gabon is one of the few places in the world that is opulent in Okoume timber – a natural superior quality hardwood timber harvested under the Sustainable Forest Management plan. The quality of this naturally durable timber is considered at par with Gurjan wood.
Greenply is also involved in saw milling of Okoume and other hardwood species. Presently the species of hardwood being sawn are Padouk and Tali. It also plans to start its own forestry operations in 2019 to augment its raw material supplies.