By Hasbin Shaw
The Managing Director of the New Company of Trade Sierra Leone Limited popularly known as SONOCO, Amadu Justice Bah, has on Friday, May 19, 2023 confirmed to journalists in Freetown that they have received the first consignment of construction materials for a business establishment that will constitute a flour mill, bakery and a center for training in baking and making of pastries.
The goal of the project is to help boost Sierra Leone’s economy and food security.
The vessel which brought the materials berthed at the Queen Elizabeth II Quay, Freetown. It was laden with steel metal rods and poles which are to be used in building a new modern and technologically driven bakery and flour mill, which will also contain a training center at Wellington, in the East End of Freetown.
The estimated worth of the project is over US$60,000,000, and the mill will have the capacity to produce 6,000 tons of flour a day, with a storage capacity of 40,000 tons, according to Bah.
In an interview with Premier News, Justice Bah added that SONOCO is established in Guinea and Ivory Coast, and is now extending its operations into Sierra Leone.
He recalled that over three years ago, President Bio visited Guinea and spoke with stakeholders of SONOCO on the need to construct a bakery and flour mill in Sierra Leone, as a way of putting an end to the constant shortages of bread and flour in the Country.
“Many people doubted the project when we started, while others criticized, calling it all sort of names as a way to mellow down our collective efforts with the Government. And in recent times, some people were even saying that the project has elapsed,” Justice Bah lamented.
“But we are here this morning to show off that the SONOCO Project is alive and we have never stopped working on it. Though we have had a rough start due to COVID-19 and other important things that we must put in place to ensure that the factory is up and running, because it is not going to be an import-led activity, but a factory that you build from ground…,” Justice Bah stated.
He said that their initial plan had been limited to only constructing a bakery and a flour mill, “but President Bio emphasized the need for SONOCO to transfer the skills of producing flour, pastry or bread baking to Sierra Leoneans, in order to ensure the continuous growth of the country’s human capital development, which is why the factory will also have a training center for pastry, cake baking etc”.
Bah said that the SONOCO Project is a symbol of hope for Sierra Leone, commenting that it will create employment and professionalize the trade of baking, and occasion a significant change in the pastry and cake industry in Sierra Leone.
“The project is also going to help the reliance on dollar, considering the fact that the country is not into exporting, but with SONOCO flour mills, it will serve both the local and international markets and bring foreign exchange in the country through exportation, and then boost its economy.”
He reiterated that once the project is completed, flour shortage will become a history for Sierra Leone.
Juldeh Jalloh, the General Manager of SIAF Group, a Subsidiary of SONOCO which is in charge of fund raising, project structuring and implementation, said that President Bio had asked both SONOCO and SIAF to replicate all what they had done in Guinea for the people of Sierra Leone.
He said that they had been collaborating with SONOCO and the Government of Sierra Leone on the project for over three years.
He said: “These consignments that you are seeing here took us about a year just to manufacture the equipment, we also had COVID, which also disrupted the process, even though we did not stop working on it, but it impacted the slow pace of the project.”