Gov’t withdraws from Justin Sugar Mills project in Batouri

The Cameroonian government, through a correspondence from the Minister of Industry, Ernest Gbwaboubou, dated December 11, 2015, notified the CEO of the Justin Sugar Mills company, Dieudonné Dong Thry Dong, “the disengagement of the State from investments in the sugar sector”, including the one initiated by Justin Sugar Mills in Batouri, Eastern Cameroon.

The new Minister of Industry, who acted following instructions from the Prime Minister in a letter dated December 10, 2015, acknowledging this sugar project as “being an initiative essentially from the private sector”.

Thus, it puts an end to the battle started in June 2014 by his predecessor, Emmanuel Bondé, in order to push away Justin Sugar Mills from this food industry project which should create approximately 10,000 jobs in landlocked East Cameroon.

On June 26, 2014, the then Minister of Industry, on the grounds of “dysfunctions” had announced the termination of said memorandum. This was noted in the implementation of the memorandum of understanding signed on April 13, 2012, which links the State of Cameroon and Justin Sugar Mills to the Batouri sugar industry project.

It was a complaint for the misappropriation of public funds against Mr. Dong. He was even filed at the Special Criminal Court (the withdrawal of this complaint was initiated by the new minister of Industry on instruction from the PM).

Legislation relating to incentives for private investment since December 11, 2015, the Cameroonian government has fully handed the project back to Justin Sugar Mills.

In the correspondence notifying the project investor of the withdrawal of the State and the upcoming withdrawal of the complaint against them from the Special Criminal Court, the new minister of Industry asked the CEO of Justin Sugar Mills “to request, if necessary, the Investments Promotion Agency (in French API), in order to profit from facilities and the support of the State, within the limits of the legal and regulatory framework in force”.

In other words, if Justin Sugar Mills follows this suggestion from the government, the Batouri sugar industry project could soon profit from exemptions of 5 to 10 years. This will be during the installation and production stages as provided by the legislation relating to incentives for private investments in the Republic of Cameroon.

With an investment of FCfa 60 billion in total, the Batouri industrial sugar complex ought to have started operations from January 2014, if not for the many difficulties faced by the project, which should lead to the creation of the first true challenger to the French group Vilgrain on the sugar market in Cameroon (its local subsidiary, Sosucam, is the only company producing sugar from principally local sugar cane).

The project makes provision, in a first stage, for the creation of sugar cane plantations on 15,000 hectares, out of a total area of 155,000 hectares granted to Justin Sugar Mills in Tikondi and Bodongué, in the Batouri area.

With a processing plant of an initial production capacity of 60,000 tons per year, the Batouri sugar complex would generate 5,000 direct jobs and 2,500 indirect jobs.