Gal-Oya sugar from April

Cassandra Abeynaike

Gal-Oya Plantations (Pvt) Limited which did not function for over a decade due to civil unrest and mismanagement will restart operations by the first week of April. CEO, Gamini Ratnayake told ‘Daily News Business’ that their target is to produce up to 4,000 metric tons of raw sugar per month.

Ratnayake said Rs. 1.4 billion have been invested on the project. “We are planning to inject a further Rs. 600 million to consolidate this operation,” he said. The current sugar cane plantation has the capacity to produce an estimated 2,000 metric tons of brown sugar per day. “We can increase this by another 160 metric tons through out growers,” he said.

The plantation is on 7,659 hectares of land, of which 5,200 are cultivatable. The company is planning to extend this by more than 6,000 ha by 2015. The rest of the land has been divided into five major zones; Varipathanchena, Galmuduwa, Deegawapi, Hingurana and Neetha. “They are being used for factory buildings, housing complexes, high land reservations, field roads and drainages.”

This venture is providing 4,400 farmer families with employment. “Within the next few months this number will increase, giving more irrigation families livelihood operations and improve standards of living,” he said.

The management is planning to produce electricity in the future and supply purified water . “We also hope to produce spirits and provide them as raw material that can be used by other companies to manufacture products,” he disclosed.

The company is on schedule towards its initial production date with 90 percent of the assembly and repairs of machinery being completed. Also as planned, the factory has begun to automate some of its sections with the required equipment arriving from overseas.