- Staff writer
PRESIDENT OPENS COROBRIK’S KWASTINA FACTORY
President Cyril Ramaphosa says the public and private sectors can come together to form productive partnerships to accelerate South Africa’s economy and create jobs. He was speaking at the opening of the Corobrik Kwastina brick manufacturing factory at Driefontein, Gauteng.
Corobrik’s new R800 million Kwastina (‘Home of the Brick’) factory is the most technologically advanced and environment friendly brick manufacturing plant in Africa.
The president said that Corobrik had made a significant contribution to the country’s efforts to extract greater value from its natural resources, by making its bricks from raw materials extracted from South African soil. This is an important part of government’s efforts to support localisation, supplier and enterprise development, as well as empowerment.
The hi-tech facility is fully automated, from mixing the raw materials to the end product. It is capable of producing 100 million bricks a year and will be flexible enough to produce small quantities of bespoke products for the architectural market.
After a comprehensive analysis of Corobrik’s existing manufacturing process, the Kwastina greenfield project resulted in a new shaping plant, a new fully automatic wet side, a plant for direct setting, two tunnel dryers, two tunnel kilns, and a new unloading and packaging plant for dispatch packs without pallets.
Corobrik is extending its product range, with various new products having being introduced already. Current trials are being carried out with brick glazing for bespoke projects, as well as the clay raw material to produce different colours to give Kwastina a unique footprint in the country.
