Africa

Capital Star Steel SA, based in Maputo Province, Mozambique, is a subsidiary of the South African company, Capital Africa Steel (Pty) Ltd (CAS), the company through which Wilson Bayly Holmes-Ovcon (WBHO) operates its construction materials businesses. WHBO is one of the largest construction companies in Southern Africa, listed on the Johannesburg Securities Exchange with 12,000 employees, and had a turnover in 2013 of more than R23 million.

MC 2014 is the global forum for exchanging views and developing capacity, to ensure that new mines are designed with closure in mind, and old sites are closed economically, whilst minimising environmental and societal impacts.

At the age of 75 Seed Co is an established player on the global agribusiness scene though it does not spend as much time in the headlines as some of its rivals. Nevertheless on the continent of Africa it is the biggest seed company, outstripping the large multinationals also interested in the African market in both volumes and value. Seed Co develops and markets certified crop seeds, including hybrid maize seed, cotton, wheat, soya bean, barley, sorghum and ground nut.

Palabora Copper extracts and processes copper and other by-products in the Ba-Phalaborwa area of Limpopo Province. The unique formation known as the Palabora Igneous Complex is a geologically fascinating region. Archaeological evidence and carbon isotope dating indicate that primitive mining and smelting of copper took place at Phalaborwa some 1,000 years ago. This was followed by the smelting of iron ore 700 years later.

Zimkhitha Zatu (30), who holds a responsible managerial position in the finance department of South Africa's largest cement manufacturer, believes that women who enter the construction industry should keep an eye out for male counterparts willing to become mentors. “You will be surprised by the number of male employees who are always willing to mentor their female colleagues and help them to make a success of themselves in this hard industry,” says Zatu.

AHRLAC made its debut public flight on August 13. It is the first military fixed wing aircraft to be fully designed, tested and developed in Africa. The aircraft addresses a key industry need by performing the combined tasks that previously required four separately configured planes. It integrates designs from attack helicopters, surveillance platforms and reconnaissance aircraft with ability to carry surveillance, weapons, radar and electronic warfare systems.

Though Tata had been selling vehicles into the Zambian market for many years prior to that through dealership agreements, it was in 1978 that the Indian industrial giant first established a company based there. This was the first to be set up in the entire continent, and though today the group's African headquarters is in South Africa, and no fewer than 14 countries have their own Tata subsidiary, Tata Zambia, which also looks after neighbouring Malawi where it has a branch office, remains the deepest ingrained and most diverse of all national subsidiaries.

It is good to have a company name that gives a hint to what that company actually does, and from that point of view Primefuels is very aptly named. It is a company, or rather a group of companies, that specialises in providing bulk liquid and dry cargo logistics and transportation services to its customers in East and Central Africa. Headquartered in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, it is today present in nine countries in East and Central Africa, with a comprehensive regional network.

It was in Larderello, Italy, back in 1904 that the world’s first geothermal power plant was constructed, a facility that continues to produce green energy to this very day. In the 110 years since then more than 20 of the planet’s major countries have integrated geothermal power into their respective energy portfolios, countries including the US, Japan, Indonesia, Mexico, Cost Rico and Iceland. Kenya, meanwhile, holds the distinction of being the first country in Africa to generate electricity from geothermal sources.

When a young Welshman by the name of Herbert Evans first arrived in Johannesburg in 1889 he probably would never have believed that in 2014 a company would exist that traces its history back well over a century. It was however the young Mr Evans who introduced the production of floor polish, carriage varnish and ready-mixed tinted paints to the country of South Africa.