Trinidad Cement Ltd (TCL), which is celebrating its 60th anniversary, is preparing to break into the global oil well cement market. Chairman Satnarine Bachew told reporters the company has plans for expansion of its markets and aiming at the oil well cement market. Oil well cement is used in the oil and gas industry to case oil wells and keep them in place. Bachew said TCL has been selling oil well cement on the local market for years and has now decided to offer the product on the international market.
“Halliburton has been our main customer up to now and they have tested our product from depths of up to 18,000 feet without any issues. We are very confident that we can break through on the external market,” Bachew said when he spoke with reporters after an interfaith service to celebrate TCL’s 60th anniversary at its Claxton Bay headquarters
Bachew explained that oil well cement is manufactured under special conditions but TCL does not need to purchase any special equipment to produce oit since it has been manufacturing the product for the last 15 years. “It is about proper promoting of our product and lobbying at the correct places and getting involved in the process. We already know how to manufacture the product, we have the expertise, we have been tried and tested by Halliburton and we think we are ready to move on to the global stage,” he said.
Bachew said TCL also plans to increase its presence in Central America “where the real strong markets are right now”. “We are already in those countries and the intention is to continue to grow and expand in those countries and may be acquire a new cement plant, who knows. That is our thrust,” he explained.
Labour Minister Errol McLeod, who delivered the feature address at the interfaith service, recounted his interactions with TCL’s management when he was president general of the Oilfields Workers Trade Union (OWTU). He said he shared a “special friendship” with former chairmen of the company. McLeod urged TCL’s employees and management to work together with a common purpose. He said the company has endured many challenges over the years, including a brutal 92 day strike in 2012, and now it is time for healing.
“Emulate love and respect, restraint and forgiveness and you know what I am talking about. Let it be about community and purpose. I recommend these very commanding principles which will take you beyond the four score,”he said. Representatives of the Islamic, Hindu and Christian faiths offered prayers and blessings for TCL’s continued success and urged employees and management to work together.
Bachew said following the 2012 strike, TCL embarked on a series of healing programmes addressing health, happiness and harmony. “There have been several interventions. We have made some progress. We are not where we would like to be as yet and as you know quite a bit of trade disputes are coming up in the Industrial Court.” He said he believes that once those disputes are out of the way, there will be “a better path for us to really get down into healing process”.
“We have improved the productivity. It is better. It is back to where it was pre-strike last year,” said Bachew. who described 2013 as one of TCL’s better years.
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