Africa Group

As one of the pioneering companies to establish itself on the African continent, Kewalram Nigeria has served as a gateway to the rest of Africa for the Group. It started as J.T. Chanrai (as the company was known in the early 20th century), selling Indian textiles and fabrics in Nigeria, but over the decades the company expanded with department stores across the country, and diversified its commercial interests into manufacturing, agriculture, agro-allied products, water solutions and distribution. Collectively known as the Africa Group, its businesses and operations are based in West and Central Africa.

In the 1960s through Afprint, the Group decided to venture into manufacturing with a textile and finishing factory. In 1972, it expanded its operations with a spinning mill. That same year, Afprint was listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange.

By the 1980s, Kewalram Nigeria had moved into the distribution business representing many large international companies. Today, it is the largest business unit of the Africa Group with activities in three main segments, and a large network of outlets across the country.

Kewalram Nigeria distributes the Bridgestone range of tyres for cars and trucks, with technical after-sales support, and a state-of-the-art tyre retreading centre in Lagos. In the automobile business, it has showrooms and service centres across the country to distribute the Mitsubishi and Fuso range of vehicles to both corporate and retail customers.

For consumer products, Kewalram Nigeria represents many international brands, such as Ocean from Italy and Daewoo Electronics from South Korea. As a natural extension of this, the Group has set up assembly facilities for chest freezers and fridges.

In 1986, because of a shortage in industrial raw materials, the Group opted for backward integration by cultivating cotton. Consequently, Afcott was launched in the north eastern part of Nigeria. One of Afcott’s most significant achievements is to pioneer extension farming. This programme extends to six states and offers livelihood for over 20,000 farming families. Afcott is expanding to other neighbouring countries like Cameroon, Chad and Ghana.

Following the success of Afcott, Sunseed was set up in 1998 in central Nigeria. Both Sunseed and Afcott represent a bold attempt to leverage the Group’s core competencies in the cotton and vegetable oil industries. Afcott’s involvement in farming also led to the development of Springfield Agro in 2003.

Springfield Agro, provides total farming solutions, distributes seeds, a full range of agro-chemicals (herbicides, fungicides, insecticides and storage chemicals), fertilizers, tractors and farming implements. In addition, it has set up a full-fledged tractor assembly plant and a fertilizer blending facility.

As the environment changes drastically and access to filtered water becomes critical, the Group recently set up Eco Water Management Limited in collaboration with ION Exchange Limited (IEL) of India. IEL is a leader in the water purification business in Asia. Eco Water adds value by providing water purification solutions to homes, industries and communities thereby helping to the achievement of the Millenium Development goals with quality products and services.

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