Dangote
Sugar Refinery has declared N4.8 billion dividend for the year ended December
31, 2014 to be paid to its shareholders. The dividend, which translates into 40
kobo per share, was approved by the shareholders at the 9th Annual General
Meeting (AGM) in Lagos. In his address to shareholders, the Chairman of Dangote
Sugar, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, said despite the challenging circumstance in 2014,
Dangote Sugar posted a turnover of N95 billion.
Profit before tax and profit after tax stood at N15.3
billion and N11.6 billion, compared with N16.3 billion and N10.8 billion
respectively. According to Dangote, it remains the company’s policy to return
part of its profits as dividends to shareholders at the end of each business
year.
However, he said the dividend paid depends on the company’s
financial performance, investment decisions, liquidity levels and banks
balances.
“In view of the significant investments required for our
backward integration projects, the company is in need of additional funding. As
such, the Board has taken the decision to reduce dividend payment for the year
from 60 kobo per share to 40 kobo.
This is a transitional situation, requiring our short term
sacrifices in order to build for the future, and is necessary for us to
maintain prudent capital and liquidity levels to sustain our operations, in
tandem with our backward integration projects,” Dangote said.
Speaking on the company’s operations, he said the company
had to contend with heightened insecurity in the north eastern Nigeria, along
with other consumer oriented businesses.
“Access
to our key markets was hampered,while we also had to grapple with reduced
consumer purchasing power and periodic menace of low-priced unlicensed imported
sugar. Notwithstanding this, our local sales volumes exceeded 780,000 tonnes in
2014, a slight reduction on the prior year,” Dangote said. He disclosed that 10
years from now, the target of the company is to produce 1.5 million tonnes of
refined sugar from locally grown sugarcane.
No comments:
Post a Comment