Zim timber firm in Botswana

Fraser Mpofu
Correspondent | Thursday March 20, 2008 00:00

Rising demand for timber in Botswana has over the years seen Zimbabwe's biggest timber grower and processor, Allied Timber Holdings, formerly Forestry Company of Zimbabwe, setting up Altim City Botswana in Gaborone.

Now, Border Timbers is following suit. In the company's financial report for last year, Border Timbers said the group was waiting to be awarded tenders in Botswana and Mozambique for transmission poles. 'Demand for light poles in Botswana was expected to remain strong as farmers continued to fence off farms to comply with a government directive,' said the company.

Border Timbers has three divisions - forestry, manufacturing and sawmilling.
The forestry division manages more than 47,000 hectares of pine and eucalyptus plantations on five estates - Charter, Sawerombi, Tilbury, Imbeza and Sheba all in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe.

Under the sawmilling division, Border Timbers owns three medium-sized sawmills which can saw both pine and eucalyptus logs. The sawmills - Charter, Tilbury and Sheba - are situated within the company's plantation areas.

The manufacturing division, being operated under the banner of Border Timbers International (BTI) produces engineered wooden doors and other types of doors for export markets. Some of the doors, the frame-ledged and braced doors, are exported to Botswana, South Africa and Swaziland. Located in Mutare, in eastern Zimbabwe, BTI exports more than 95 percent of its production.

Commenting on renewal of forests, Border Timbers Limited said planting targets for this financial year would be met because of torrential rains that fell over the past few months.

However, the excessive rains adversely affected harvesting operations. Another problem the company is facing is a severe lack of labour in eastern Manicaland Province as employees abscond from work in search of diamonds in the Chiadzwa area in eastern Zimbabwe, while others opted to undertake cross-border trading in neighbouring Mozambique. This reduced productive and operational time.

Another negative development was that the company's forestry and saw-milling businesses were affected by wild fires.

'A total of 46 fires were reported and 540 hectares of timber were burnt. At least 94 percent of plantations burnt was at Charter and Tilbury, and all these were due to arson,' said the group.