"As compared to Poland, for instance, which has attained a saturation degree, Romania is currently very much underinvested (...), in the high qualified labour force's area, especially on certain segments, included. I wouldn't say it is a cheap labour force, because it is quite difficult to have well-qualified people, well-trained engineers, for sophisticated jobs and pay them wrongly. Yet, the fact that such abilities, such competence exist makes things progress faster, so that the alternative is to bring in foreign engineers, a know-how transfer and this usually takes time," says Marian Nastase.
As for the new Tax Code, which the Parliament gathers for on Monday, August 24, in an extraordinary session, the ALRO Company CEO underlines that predictability is much more important the taxes level, although "we are interested in as smaller taxes as possible," adding that for now he wishes a consensus on the Tax Code, "no matter of its shape."
Marian Nastase also talks, in the interview to AGERPRES, about the financial results of ALRO Company on the first six months of 2015, pointing out that they were being influenced by the significant drop of the energy prices, about the investment plans for the future five years, as well as about the attention the management pays top the domestic market, since he had noticed an increase of the sophistication degree.
The ALRO Company CEO adds that, as regards the Tax Code, the most important is that it will last a period of time, long enough, let's say for 5-6 years, unchanged, so that everybody will be happy with it.
ALRO ended the H1, 2015 in the black, after three years of losses, and the most important reason of the increase was the costs' cut, first of all the energy prices' drop, and secondly, the fact that the energy market has entered a maturity phase, with access for the people to an increased competitive market, eventually, says Nastase.
ALRO Company has two business models: primary aluminum, a commodities' business, and the high and very high added value products, such as the processed goods (plate, sheet, strip etc that can be delivered anywhere in the world). Our markets are America, an old one, South Korea and other Asian countries, all old markets. Then, we have started to redevelop them in a quite aggressive way. We have stretched to Mexico, Southern Africa, Singapore, some Asian countries, all of which with great potential, that require high and very high added value, sophisticated products for sophisticated applications, for the car-maker industry, for the medical industry, for aviation industry, for naval industry etc, says the ALRO CEO.
Export remains very important to ALRO, from 70 to 80 percent we export our production, says Nastase. Of course, the Western European market is still the core market, with Poland, Germany and the Northern countries, yet the rhythm of growth in Europe is smaller than it is in Mexico or the above-mentioned countries, he adds.
ALRO Company employs currently rd 3,500 people, while horizontally it influences directly 60,000 employees, with our activity, there are plants that depend on us, suppliers that depend on us, more or less. Mainly, ALRO has 2,500 staff, Alum Tulcea rd 800, and Vimetco Extrusion rd 200. It's quite stable for many years now, concludes Marian Nastase. (source: actmedia.eu)
