Ethiopia Has Huge Investment Potential with Conducive Env't, Says Soufflet Malteries G/Manager

Addis Ababa, October 13/2022/ENA/   The General Manager of Soufflet Ethiopia Malteries, the company that invested 60 million Euros in the country five years ago, said Ethiopia has a huge long term investment potential.

Speaking with ENA Soufflet Ethiopia Malteries General Manager, Jean Benoit Vivet said, on top of Ethiopia’s huge investment potential, there are institutions that go extra miles to support investors.

With a strong will, the Ethiopian government accepts investors and helps them to secure land and make the investment as easy as possible, he said.

‘‘It was reassuring to say that there is a system in place with the strong will from the Ethiopian government to attract investors and help them to secure land and various utilities to make the investment as easy as possible. That was the reason that we decided to invest.’’

Soufflet Ethiopia Malteries is the first investor in the Bole Lemmi Industrial Park which is the biggest malt factory in Ethiopia.

Ethiopia is the largest barley producer in Africa and the fourth-largest beer maker on the continent, where the market is flourishing. .

According to Vivet, Soufflet’s aim is to fully substitute imported malt, which Ethiopia used to import to the tunes of 100 million USD.

The factory is confident to source 100 percent of its malt barley locally, the general manager said.

Currently, the malt house has an annual production capacity of 60,000 tons per year and is aiming for 120,000 tons a year in the near future if the market continues at this pace.

In a bid to achieve that goal the company is providing support to barley farmers in the country to enable them become more professionals in collaboration with pertinent government institutions including Ethiopia Investment Commission, Agricultural Transformation agency and others, he said.

"That partnership has been allowing us to increase the yield, to have more area cultivated with  malt barley."

Vivet further stated that the company's ambition is to make farmers professionals so that they are able to produce a quality product that fulfills the most stringent specifications, even from the international standards point of view.

To produce 100 percent of the barley locally, the group is reinforcing the agricultural, technical and commercial support to farmers, he elaborated.

Now the company is introducing free varieties of barley seed that are becoming popular among farmers, he said, adding the malt house is currently the largest producer of certified seed in Ethiopia for malt barley.

 "We did research and development to see what the varieties are more adapted from the industrial point of view, from the farmer's perspective, we register these varieties and engage as well in seed multiplications ’’

This establishment of Malteries Soufflet in Ethiopia is the group's first in the barley sector in Africa, Malteries Soufflet being present in 14 other countries. The malthouse in Addis Ababa is the Group's 28th malthouse.

With this establishment, the Soufflet Group is committed to a project to replace imports throughout the value chain: the barley used is grown locally and the malt is sold directly to local brewers. This will be expected to substitute imported malt barley.