Madagascar: Nouvelle Brasserie de Madagascar to invest EUR1.8 mln in doubling production

Nouvelle Brasserie de Madagascar SA plans to double output to meet increasing demand for its beer, seven months after starting operations in the Indian Ocean island nation, the company’s chairman was quoted as saying by Bloomberg on June, 9.

Nouvelle will spend 1.8 million euros ($2.6 million) to boost production to 20,000 hectolitres from about 10,000 hectolitres, Chairman Richard Wooding said in an interview. The company has a market share of about 10 percent, he said.

The company signed contracts on June, 8 for extra machines for its factory in Ambatolampy, about 70 kilometres south of Antananarivo, Wooding said. It will also distribute beer in more cities, he said.

Nouvelle, which is targeting 25 percent of Madagascar’s beer market within three years, starting brewing Skol in November. It’s 40 percent-owned by Phoenix Beverages Ltd. (PBL), Mauritius’s biggest brewer and softdrinks maker that bottles Coca-Cola, while Brussels-based Unibra SA (UNIB) also holds a 40 percent stake and French development financier, Proparco has 20 percent.

Societe Tananarivienne de Refrigeration et de Boissons Gazeuses is the only other brewery operating in Madagascar.

10 June, 2011