15:T726,

Dangote Sugar Refinery (DSR) Plc plans to resume exports to selected West African countries in the first quarter of 2014, the company’s management has said.

DSR in a statement issued in Lagos at the weekend said that the company is also working towards meeting the national sugar master plan.

“Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc (DSR) is actively pursuing a backward integration policy with a target of producing a total of 1.5 million tonnes of sugar per annum locally from its subsidiaries,” the statement said.

It disclosed that the company increased its share of the Nigerian sugar market in the nine months ended September 30, 2013.

The statement disclosed that DSR plans an additional investment of N180 billion for four factories in Sokoto and Kebbi states and has 150,000 hectares of land allocated for the project in Kogi, Kwara, Jigawa, Sokoto, Taraba and Kebbi.

DSR acquired the moribund 50,000 tonnes per annum capacity Savannah Sugar Company Limited in Numan, Adamawa State, in 2002. The buy-over, midwifed by the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), was the fallout of the failure of several attempts made by the Federal Government to reposition the nation’s foremost sugar company.

Dangote Industries Limited (DIL), the parent company of DSR, emerged as the preferred bidder and core investor and after which it embarked on a turnaround of the acquired company.

As a front line player in the backward integration policy, Savannah Sugar’s projection is to produce 1 million tonnes of white sugar by 2015, cultivating 100,000 hectares in about six states of Sokoto, Kebbi, Jigawa, Taraba, Kogi and Kwara employing over 50,000 Nigerians.

•Photo shows Dangote Group President, Alhaji Aliko Dangote.

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