CHARLES MANGWIRO, Maputo, | Saturday
SOUTH African President Thabo Mbeki will join his Mozambican counterpart Joaquim Chissano to officially inaugurate the US$1,3bn MOZAL aluminium smelter in Maputo on September 21.
MOZAL, the biggest single direct investment in Mozambique since multi-party democracy in 1994, is also the anchor for the ambitious US$3,5bn Maputo development corridor initiative linking Mozambique’s port capital with South Africa’s industrial heartland 380km away in the province of Gauteng.
Mozambican government officials said Mbeki and Chissano would star at a high profile ceremony bringing together 500 of the region’s most important heads of state, business leaders and regional development partners.
MOZAL shipped its first consignment of aluminium ingots, weighing 1 300 tonnes, last month – six months ahead of schedule and just 25 months after construction teams first broke ground on the smelter complex outside Maputo.
The shipment is believed to be a world record for production from a greenfield smelter, and is also Mozambique’s first export from an Industrial Development Zone.
The shipment, valued at US$2m, will be quality tested in Brussels before finally being granted a seal of approval by the London Metal Exchange and offered on the international metals market.
A second consignment of 5000 tonnes is expected to get a ceremonial send-off at the Presidential inauguration on September 22, with a third consignment scheduled for export in October.
MOZAL’s major shareholders are the British-listed Billiton corporation (47%), Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation (25%), South Africa’s Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) (24%) and the Mozambican Government (four percent).
The Mozambique Government meanwhile announced this week that it expected an economic growth rate of between six and eight percent in 2000 despite devastating floods earlier this year.
Prime Minster Pascoal Mocumbi said this week that the country expected to reach its average annual growth rate of 10 percent again within two years. – African Eye News Service