Indian TCI Sanmar Chemicals Group intends to pump new investments of US$280 million into the Egyptian market to boost its production of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) from 200,000 to 400,000 tonnes. Egyptian Trade and Industry Minister Tarek Qabil stated Wednesday that the rise in firm's production is set to participate in saving US$400 million of PVC importing bill. He made these remarks during his meeting with Sanmar Group Chairman, PS Jayaraman in which two sides showcased the current joint projects in Port Said industrial zone and the projects that the company intends to execute within the upcoming period. Sanmar Group is the largest investing firm in the Egyptian market in chemicals field that acquired the petrochemicals plant TCI in 2007 and plans to turn it to the largest integrated producers of caustic soda and PVC in the Middle East and North Africa region. Qabil added that company's investments in Egypt hiked from US$1.15 billion to US$1.3 billion. The meeting discussed the first phase of establishing a project for producing sodium hydroxide and PVC in Port Said with the capacity of 180,000 tonnes of sodium hydroxide and 200,000 tonnes of PVC. Jayaraman and Qabil showcased the future projects of Sanmar Group that targets producing 200,000 tonnes of PVC per year in addition to two projects for producing calcium chloride with capacity estimated at 130,000 tonnes annually. Around 60 percent of Sanmar Group's products are exported while the other 40 percent are dedicated for the local markets. Qabil noted that the rise in Sanmar's production of PVC would participate in lowering the large amount of state's current imports since the new production is set to be allocated for the local market. On other side, Jayaraman stated that Sanmar Group is the largest firm in Egypt, Middle East, and North Africa as it provides 2,000 direct and indirect job opportunities besides issuing products in the Egyptian market that worth around 2 billion pounds. He noted that the products of the group are used in different productive sectors notably agricultural, health care, construction, infrastructure, automotive ones.
