ZIMBABWE – Zimbabwean soft drink and alcoholic beverage consumers manufacturers have become choosy as they seek value propositions to survive the country’s current economic difficulties but this has impacted on brewer, Delta Corporation, whose revenues for the year to March have declined 10% to $483 million.
Earnings per share in the company declined 12% to 5.70 cents, the company said Wednesday. As a result of this, there will be no major capital intensive projects for this year, with the company electing instead to spend little on replacements.
In the past year, Delta Corporation – which is now controlled by AB InBev after it merged with SABMiller invested about $40 million in capital expenditure to build to breweries.
Profit for the year amounted to $69.8 million with dividend for the period set at 5.45 cents per share.
“The economic volatility in the country resulted in a very challenging operating environment. There have been difficulties in transacting for the public and this has made purchasing for our products difficult for consumers,” Mathlogonolo Valela, executive director for finance said.
Delta Corp’s lager beer consumption volumes for the period declined to 1.2 million hectolitres. Castle Lite volumes have however jumped by more than 100 percent while Chibuku is showing some resilience.
The company has now lost about 800 000 hectolitres in lager beer since 2013 but expects fundamentals to now start improving owing to resilience in the value brands and the premium segment.
May 15, 2017: BUSINESS REPORT ONLINE
