KBL continues to downsize
Staff Writer | Friday February 19, 2016 15:00
Corporate Communications Manager, Mokoro Ketsitlile said the business had been forced to come to this decision in the wake of sustained unfavourable regulatory and trading conditions that have forced them to restructure accordingly.
“Further, the current water and electricity shortages have exacerbated the situation, leading to production stoppages and loss of capacity by operations to consistently produce and deliver our products to adequately meet demand; rendering us, as a saving grace, to import products from neighbouring South Africa,” he said.
Ketsitlile did not however rule out the possibility of job losses with the closure of the depot, saying across the business, there are 54 workers who will be affected by the restructuring.
“As we have done in the past, the utmost will be done to try to re-assign affected employees within other areas of operations, and unfortunately, those whom the business is unable to absorb will sadly face retrenchments,” he added.
After the shutdown, Ketsitlile said customers in the Selebi-Phikwe area would be serviced from the KBL Palapye sales and distribution depot.
Since 2008, KBL has faced an ever-increasing levy on alcoholic beverages and a host of regulatory measures.
This included the reduction of alcohol trading hours, the Traditional Beer Regulations and increased licensing restrictions, among others.
Last year, KBL shut down its opaque brewery operations in Lobatse, impacting on 88 jobs.
This followed the closure of the KBL Palapye Brewery operations in 2013.
In 2013, KBL and the then BBL merged into a single business entity in an effort to streamline operations and costs when faced with the tightening of the regulations and the levy, which is currently pegged at 55 percent.