Ebonyi Pipes Production Limited (EEPL), owned by the government of Ebonyi State, has begun discussions towards strengthening business relationship with Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals Limited (IEPL), Port Harcourt, in a bid to expand its production of pipes.
Ebonyi Pipes is a heavy buyer of HDPE raw materials from Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals for its pipes production, which is said to service the South East geopolitical zone.
Recently, Governor David Umahi of Ebonyi State dispatched his deputy, Eric Kelechi Igwe, leading a three-man team made up of Elizabeth Ogbaga, commissioner for commerce and industry; Ben Okah, a former commissioner, and Mike Obaji, the general manager of EEPL, to the Eleme premises of Indorama-EPL, to discuss how the state-owned pipe making company could gain greater business cooperation from Indorama-EPL.
The Ebonyi company, an existing customer of IEPL buys HDPE pipe grade to produce pipes.
According to the Ebonyi deputy governor, Igwe, they were sent by the Governor, Umahi, to explore further business cooperation with IEPL, to ensure that the state-owned pipe making company gets stronger, expand operations to meet with its now increasing customer base, especially around the South East zone.
Igwe informed that Ebonyi Pipes Production was importing initially its raw materials (polymer resin), but has since turned to Nigeria based (Port Harcourt) Indorama for such supplies.
By far, analysts say the move has enabled EEPL to cut down on its operational costs, as it no longer has to source for foreign exchange to import foreign polymer resin.
According to the Ebonyi deputy governor, EEPL is now doing pretty well, as many customers book for their high quality pipes in advance.
He lauded Indorama for turning around the old, badly managed Eleme Petrochemicals Company Limited (EPCL) as a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), before it was sold as scrap to Indorama group in 2006. Since then, the fortune of the petrochemicals plant has been turned around, making it today as one of the best run petrochemicals plant in the world.
Igwe equally commended Indorama for building its soon-coming gas-based fertilizer company, with world scale capacity of 1.4 million metric tons of Urea per annum, with energy-efficiency and state-of-the-art technology.
He said Indorama’s feat had become the pride of industrialisation in Nigeria.
