(Ecofin Agency) - At the beginning of February, Zambian subsidiary of Lafarge commissioned at its Ndola plant, a new plug and grind plant. It is to produce 100,000 tons of cement per year thus bringing the overall capacity of the plant to 500,000 tons.

It is a portable cement grinding plant whose components have been imported so that remaining construction works include just construction of foundations and earth-moving on the site.

Director of Lafarge Zambia, Emmanuel Rigaux, said “this project which is part of the company’s strategy for sustainable development used the latest technology. It has utilized very minimal amount of land and has bag filters”.

These bag filters prevent emissions of pollutants into the environment and eliminate gas particles that are released during production of cement.

The Director General also put an emphasis on the economic impact of the infrastructure saying: “The plant will produce Supaset which will be exported to DRC and other neighboring countries. These sales are in hard currency which is good for the company and ultimately for the country, of course in addition to increasing non-traditional exports (NTE)”.

Stéphanie C. TOHON