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M&G PLANS FOR CAPACITY EXPANSIONS FOR 2004 IN LATIN AMERICA
15 January 2004 - M&G Group
| The M&G group today announced it will increase the production rate at its facility in Altamira , Mexico to 1200t/day (438kt/y – 965MM lbs/y) by early Q2 2004. |
This huge increase in the production rate at the plant is achievable as a result of having successfully completed a number of tests to show the residual capacity potential of the plant and M&G’s expertise in process design. M&G commissioned the construction of the Altamira facility in mid 2003 and it remains the largest single-stream PET plant ever built. The new unit has a nameplate capacity of 750 t/day (275kt/y – 600MMlbs/y) and although there were a few teething problems during commissioning, the plant has now been running at a very comfortable rate of 850 t/day (310kt/y – 685MMlbs/y) for several months. Marco Ghisolfi, CEO and shareholder in M&G says;
”I do not expect to see a great impact from this de-bottlenecking capacity growth as all the markets (especially that of Mexico) are still projecting double digit growth for the next few years with the possible exception of the USA.Even though growth in the American market is slowing, its size means that an annual growth of 5% is sufficient to cause a large demand for extra resin. In addition, our plants are part of a global supply network; they can produce global grades and their cost structure takes into account the logistics of global supply. We expect also that several new brand-owners will adopt PET in the next few years which will compensate for the maturing and slow down in growth predicted for some markets.” M&G also today announced, as a committed PET producer in Brazil, its willingness to invest in PET resin production assets in the region as soon as a number of issues that penalise local investment are abolished. The new plant would probably be located at Recife , although a final decision as to the location and capacity of the plant has not yet been taken. Marco Ghisolfi, CEO and shareholder in M&G says;
“The historically high rate for imports into Brazil stems from the reluctance of local owners to invest in both PET resin and preform production capacities. There are various reasons for this reluctance including some off the fiscal policies of previous governments. I believe that the new administration, having identified the negative impact of these policies on the Brazilian trade balance, has initiated actions to eliminate such distortions. We are ready to invest in Brazil and grow with the increased demand for PET in Brazil (and the surrounding countries), when we feel confident that sustainable changes in policy are being put into effect. Once again, in Brazil as in the rest of the world, M&G will be faithful to its mission: to work in a collaborative fashion with all elements of the PET industry chain, with the objective of enabling innovation in resin technology to stimulate new demand for PET as well as investing in new manufacturing assets to produce resin at an economically viable and sustainable cost.”
http://www.mgpolymers.com
About: M&G Group
M&G is a family owned chemical engineering company headquartered in Tortona, Italy. It develops innovative and cost effective PET resins for container packaging and is presently the world’s second largest producer of PET for packaging applications with production capacity of 1.3 million tonnes per annum. Group sales proceeds in 2003 were $1.6 billion of which around 80% were derived from operations involving PET.
M&G Group is divided into three business units, PET Polymer, PET Packaging and Acetates. In Europe, M&G has capacity to produce around 2.5 billion preforms per annum at two locations in Italy. It operates the largest SSP unit in North America and has the current world’s largest PET production unit (1200t/d) at its Altamira facility in Mexico. The Group has manufacturing assets in Brazil, Italy, Mexico and USA. The Group supports three R&D Facilities; Italy, USA and Brazil. |
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