The world economy still remains highly fluid and volatile, given the wars in Palestine and Ukraine, the Red Sea crisis, as well as geopolitical factors which impact the world.
Although interest rates are currently high, it is expected we will see a relaxation later this year and this will in turn bode well for emerging economies like ourselves. Mining has been adversely affected globally, with a major detrimental impact on platinum group metals operations. We have seen extensive rationalisation across our mining customer base because of this. There are also moves globally towards consolidation in the mining sector. The gold and copper mining sectors are however doing exceptionally well, given demand for these commodities.
ACTOM as a group has closed the March 2024 financial year with exceptionally good results across both our income statement and balance sheet. The diverse nature of our business from manufacturing, after-market as well as turnkey solutions has been instrumental in us achieving these outcomes. I am extremely grateful for these results and this could only be possible due to the hard work and commitment of every employee in our organisation.
Although our markets in the power generation, transmission and distribution sectors are undergoing major disruption, the group have been and continues to position ourselves to optimise loading for our factories.
We are expecting major increases in demand as power generation projects reach financial close and the transmission network is expanded to cater for the increased demand. We are actively pursuing increases in factory and workshop capacities across various product lines and are actively investing into the future and sustainability of our business.
ACTOM as a group have stepped up our sales, marketing and business development initiatives through increased visibility to key stakeholders. This has been achieved through active participation through various industry bodies and a major increase in the use of social media platforms and public relations. The group has recently featured in CNN Africa and this has increased visibility of our group capability into international markets.
ACTOM continues to look towards succession planning to ensure sustainability of the group into the future. We have recently transitioned several senior roles in the company quite seamlessly.
Our health and safety performance is currently at an LTIFR of 0.45. I would like to commend everybody for maintaining a safe work environment.
A key strategic initiative of ACTOM is that of impact on the lives of our employees and in those communities that surround us. We have made major progress in accelerating our education-related initiatives. I’m also pleased to highlight that we have embarked on an initiative to impact the lives of those who are differently abled. This training initiative is intended to ultimately lead to enterprise and supplier development opportunities.
As we emerge from our recent elections, let’s stay focused on matters within our control and not be distracted by some of the short-term noise. We are a nation of resilience, and I am optimistic of a turnaround of our current economic situation.
Mervyn Naidoo