Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Nov. 3 / Trend D.Azizov /
Germany's Knauf International GmbH plans to introduce a gypsum board production plant in Kagan in the Bukhara region. The plant will cost $50 million and launch production in April 2011. The plant's capacity will reach 20 million square meters of gypsum board per year, Uzstroymaterialy (Uzbek Construction Materials) told Trend.
The plant's corpus has already built and equipment installation is nearing completion.
Plans include commissioning the plant in late 2010 and launching production next April.
The construction of the plant began in 2008. Initially, the German company planned to build factory drywall sheets with a designed capacity of 10 million square meters worth $32 million in the Bukhara region, but later revised the project settings.
This is the second building materials production project implemented by Knauf in Uzbekistan.
In October, Knauf introduced a dry building mixtures production plant in Kagan in the Bukhara region with a cost of $2 million. The German firm installed a production line with a capacity of 60,000 tons of dry building mixtures per year. The venture plans to export 40 percent of its products.
Knauf International GmbH acquired 30.77 percent of Bukharagips' shares for $1.55 million in September 2005. The German firm undertook investment obligations for $6.3 million. Now, the German company holds a 99.6-percent share in the enterprise. The remaining 0.4 percent is owned by other shareholders.
Currently, there are two gypsum deposits in Uzbekistan - in Bukhara and Samarkand. The total capacity of gypsum stone production is 200,000 tons per year. Uzbek enterprises produce about 100,000 tons of building gypsum per year. The production of high-strength gypsum accounts for roughly 30,000-40,000 tons per year.
According to Uzstroymaterialy, the gypsum board capacity at local enterprises is 20 million square meters, while the domestic demand is about 50 million square meters per year.