Ghana’s leading cement producing factory, GHACEM, in Takoradi, Western Region, has been operating without direct power supply from the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) since November 5, 2017 till date.
The factory is currently relying on a generator set which can only power the packaging plant.
And due to the lack of adequate power, the two production plants – Mil 4 and Mil 5 – are not working.
The situation has arisen as a result of a cut in the underground cables supplying power to the company.
That underground cable supplies power to the two production plants at the factory.
This came to the fore when the Western Regional Minister, Dr Kweku Afriyie, and his deputy, Mrs Eugenia Gifty Kusi, visited GHACEM to familiarise themselves with operations of the company.
According to the Operational Support Expert at GHACEM, Mr. Fred Oboe Sam, the cut in the underground cable has heavily affected the company’s ability to produce cement on a large scale.
“As we speak we produce cement only at dawn. And the amount of money we are losing due to our inability to produce on a large scale is unimaginable.”
He explained that “their production levels have dropped sharply from 1.2 million tonnes in 2013 to only 8000 tonnes in 2017.”
“This is certainly not what we envisaged for this year… we have five plants but currently only two plants are in operation which means that our output is now less than 50 percent which not encouraging”.
But the current power challenge was not what GHACEM has to contend with. Mr. Oboe Sam stated that production levels had dropped due to unfair market practices.
According to him “some competing cement companies were importing onto the Ghanaian market less quality cements and selling them to unsuspecting customers at cheap prices.
“Others too try to avoid paying the right duties when they import these cements”.
He hinted GHACEM may consider downsizing its workforce if it continues to experience drops in production levels.
Story: From Simon Ahensah, Takoradi, Western Region