B&D Food Corporate, one of the US-based giant food companies headquartered in New York, will invest USD 350 million in a sugar plantation and factory project in Ethiopia, Nigussie Hunegnaw, Deputy General Manager of the BDFC Ethiopia, subsidiary of B&D Food Corporate, told The Reporter on Friday.

The company has already received 30,000 hectares of land in Amhara region around Tana Beles, about 500 km north-west of Addis Ababa, where it will undertake the sugar project, whose feasibility study is completed.

The company will in two to three months' time start the sugar plantation, according to the deputy manager of BDFC Ethiopia. The company will erect a sugar factory and ethanol producing plant, whose construction will commence along the sugar plantation, Nigussie said.

According to the deputy manger, the sugar factory will have the capacity of producing 50,000 to 70,000 tonnes of sugar per annum while the ethanol plant will produce up to 20,000 to 30,000 tonnes of ethanol.

BDFC Ethiopia is destined to become one of the few foreign companies investing in sugar development projects in Ethiopia.

The company had, however, set foot in Ethiopia earlier on, about a year ago, and is expanding and diversifying its investment ventures in the country.

It started its maiden investment project in Ethiopia in coffee plantation and processing plant. The company will next year start planting coffee seedlings on a 5000 hectares of land it secured in Jimma from the regional government bureau, while it will start erecting a coffee plant during the same year on a 10 hectares of land it received in Burayo, a small town some 20 km away from Addis Ababa, according to Nigussie.

The coffee plant, which will be producing instant coffee, is projected to take an investment outlay of USD 60 million and an additional nine million USD as a working capital, according to the deputy manager. The factory will have a production capacity of 1000 to 10,000 tonnes per day, he said.

BDFC Ethiopia is also in the process launching a wheat plantation project on 100,000 hectares of land with an allocated budget of USD 10 million, according to Nigussie. The company, currently in the process of negotiation to secure a total of 100,000 hectares of land, will import all the machineries required for the wheat plantation from Israel and Brazil. B&D Food Corporate is actively engaged in coffee plantation and producing, sugarcane plantation and processing, ethanol production and related activities in Brazil.

The company is reportedly producing 20 percent of the total ethanol consumption in Brazil.

Brazil is known as a leading country in the world in ethanol consumption.

By Hayal Alemayehu