Campari fertiliser plant to improve ESG rating and slash waste

Spirits company J. Wray & Nephew Limited, JWN, a member of the Campari Group, expects to have its fertiliser plant up and running in two years at the New Yarmouth estate in Clarendon, which will aid the reduction of the group’s overall water usage.

The company, which announced the US$25 million project last year, has now selected a contractor, a French company called Suez.

Italy-based Campari expects the fertiliser plant to open “late 2023 or at the beginning of 2024”, Laetitia Chevillard, senior supply chain director, said in an interview with the Financial Gleaner on Tuesday.

Chevillard said the New Yarmouth plant should serve to reduce fertiliser as the company had already secured contracts with customers. Based on the timeline for commissioning, however, it is unlikely to impact the fertiliser shortages spurred by war and pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions.

Once operational, the plant will have a capacity of 60 cubic metres of fertiliser per day. It will rival Jamaica’s current and sole manufacturer of fertiliser, Newport-Fersan, but for JWN one of the prime benefits is it provides the company a way to recycle its waste.

On Tuesday, Chevillard focused on the environmental benefits and downplayed the economics of the plant.

“This is a sustainability project, rather than a project with a return on investment,” she said. “The process generates animal feed and fertiliser. We are investing in this solution as it will not contaminate the environment,” she added.

Chevillard said that the project will improve the company’s environmental, sustainability and governance, or ESG, standing, a metric that is of growing importance to investors in the emerging ‘green capital market’. Younger investors see ESG companies as having longevity and less exposure to scandals that hurt stock prices. Campari shares are listed on the Borsa Italian exchange.

The JWN facility will transform the liquid waste from the distillery to clean water and syrup destined to the animal feeding industry. It is essentially a micro-filtration system that will replace the existing pasteuriser and reduce the need for steam and energy. It will also recover heat.

Campari Group has set targets reduce its energy and greenhouse emissions by 20 per cent by 2025 and by 30 per cent by 2030; reduce water usage by 40 per cent and 42.5 per cent, in the same respective periods; and reduce waste-to-landfill to zero by 2025.

Locally, the fertiliser market is currently served by Newport-Fersan and imports.

Jamaica imported US$9.16 million worth of fertiliser in 2020, down 10 per cent from US$10.1 million in 2019, according to United Nations trade data. Over five years, imports were highest in 2018 at US$15.9 million. The product was mainly sourced from the United States, more than US$6 million worth, followed by the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica and Trinidad & Tobago. Russia, at the tenth spot, supplied Jamaica with US$59,000 worth of fertiliser in 2020, more than double the US$25,000 traded in 2019.

The fertiliser plant will be the second major investment at New Yarmouth within the pandemic, following the US$13 million invested at the beginning of last year to construct a new column-still distillery that’s fuelled by liquefied natural gas.

business@gleanerjm.com