By NKIRUKA NNOROM

Riggs Ventures West Africa Plc, a polypropylene sacks manufacturing company, said it is set to further expand  the installed production capacity of its plant to increase output to 100 million sacks. The company had in 2012 ramped up production from 9 million sacks to over 60 million sacks.

Addressing shareholders at the company’s Annual General Meeting, AGM, in Lagos, the Managing Director/CEO, Mr. Yomi Tokosi, said that having completed the first phase of the expansion programmes, there was need to harness the company’s potential by increasing once again, the installed capacity due to rising demand from its clients, which comprise mostly of all major cement manufacturers in the country.

Consequently, he said that the company has concluded plans to dispose its unissued shares to reputable institutional investors, adding that the exercise will facilitate the commencement of the next phase of the expansion, which will entail the acquisition of additional state-of-the-art machines from the company’s equipment suppliers and technical partners, Bags Solutions worldwide, Australia.

Speaking, the chairman, Chief Rasheed Wiliams,  said that  previous expansion was undertaken with the assistance of both African Export Import Bank and Nigerian Export Import Bank between 2012 and 2013.

“The expansion led to the diversification of the company’s production lines with addition of cement and industrial sack to the agro sacks line, which existed prior to the expansion exercise,” he said.

Speaking on behalf of  other shareholders, Mr. Boniface Okezie, lauded the management for steering the ship of the company successfully through the arduous task of the initial restructuring and expansion exercise.