Beneficial acquisition CITADEL Capital announced Tuesday that it has acquired a controlling stake in two leading firms in the solid waste management sector, namely, the Egyptian Company for Solid Waste Recycling (ECARU) and the Engineering Tasks Group (ENTAG). Following the acquisition, both companies will be grouped under a single holding company, ENTAG Holding, which will serve as the core of Citadel Capital's platform investment in the solid waste management sector. "We are delighted to announce the creation of our 18th platform investment, which will be controlled through the ECO-LOGIC Opportunity-Specific Fund," said Marwan Elaraby, managing director of Citadel Capital. "The solid waste management sector is underdeveloped across the region, with a limited number of large companies operating and much of the waste not being properly treated. There is ample room for geographic expansion and vertical integration, including expansion into waste-based industries." Established in 1997, ECARU has contracts to collect and process more than 500,000 tons per year of agricultural solid waste, particularly rice straw. Although the company presently focuses on the conversion of rice straw into compost, it has pioneered a technology to produce animal fodder and is also investigating the feasibility of producing medium density fibreboard, fuel pellets and paper from rice straw. ECARU also specialises in municipal and agricultural solid waste management. The company's operations south of Cairo are executing a contract to process up to 1,500 tons of municipal waste per day, produce compost and extract recyclable materials. Its operations also include a landfill built to the highest international standards in the 15th of May City. At this stage, the company is focused on sorting and composting of municipal solid waste with plans to expand into waste collection in the future. "ECARU is also on the cutting edge of carbon credits trading," notes Citadel Capital Principal Karim Ragab, explaining that the company became one of the first Egyptian organisations to sign a greenhouse gas emission reduction purchase agreement with the World Bank in the summer of 2008, agreeing to sell 325,480 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent greenhouse gas emission reductions to the Carbon Fund for Europe. Only a handful of similar UN-backed clean development mechanism (CDM) projects have been signed in Egypt to date. In the meantime, ENTAG, established in 1995, specialises in the design, manufacturing and implementation of solid waste management systems. "Both companies are regional leaders in their field," notes Ragab. "They have substantial operations in Egypt as well as international experience that includes work in Malaysia, Sudan and Libya. The two companies are an excellent fit with Citadel Capital's strategy of turning national leaders into regional players." Citadel Capital intends to continue to develop the ECARU and ENTAG businesses as a majority shareholder alongside existing shareholders and the management team through a series of cash injections in 2009 and 2010. The two companies employ more than 1,500 staff members. Supporting small businesses LAST week, the Higher Institute for Specific Studies organised a day for entrepreneurship and small businesses. The event was held under the auspices of the Ministry of Trade and Industry as part of the Global Entrepreneurship Week, along with TMA Development, Training and Consulting and in cooperation with the Social Fund for Development, the Egyptian Junior Businessmen Association, the Middle East Council for Small Business and Entrepreneurship and the Industry Modernisation Centre. The event took place on the main lawn of the institute in the form of an exhibition for sponsoring entities services, NGOs and international student unions to support small business initiatives, social entrepreneurship and networking between students, civil society and governmental institutions. May El-Batran, TMA managing director, said the main aim of the conference was to enhance student and young graduate self-confidence. El-Batran added that small businesses are good employment vehicles for new graduates who are considered vital to national economic development. El-Batran underlined that youth participation in such events was integral to enhancing networking and introducing such ideas as those that will underpin global citizenship in the new millennium. The day was replete with awareness building seminars for students to gain government support for small businesses and entrepreneurship along with the role that can be played by other supporting institutions. Speaking to the young audience, Ashraf Gamaleddin, executive director of the Egyptian Institute for Directors at the Ministry of Investment asserted the support of the ministry for such initiatives and the importance of small businesses and entrepreneurship in Egypt. Gamaleddin also announced that the ministry had started a LE1 billion fund to support small businesses. Reframing climate change ON 24 NOVEMBER, the World Population Annual Report was released under the auspices of Amr Moussa, secretary-general of the Arab League. The report, entitled Facing a Changing World: Women, Population and Climate, explores connections among population dynamics, reproductive health, women's lives and the impacts of climate change. The report describes what can be done to slow down -- and possibly roll back -- climate change, and what must be done to help the poor to adapt to change already underway. This report aims to remind the international community that climate change is more than an issue of energy efficiency or carbon emissions; it is also about people and where and how they live, what they consume and the rights and opportunities available to them. Being released in the lead-up to the 15th Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Copenhagen, the report amounts to a call for reframing the climate change debate by putting people at the centre. The report addresses questions such as: How do population dynamics affect greenhouse gases and climate change? Will urbanisation and an ageing population help or hinder efforts to adapt to global warming? Could better reproductive healthcare and improved relations between women and men make a difference in the fight against climate change?
