Gulf Aluminium Rolling Mills (Garmco), which registered sales of 66,370 tonnes for the first half of this year, expects to sell in excess of 150,000 tonnes in the whole of this year, thanks to an expansion in capacity in the second half.

Sales for the whole of 2004 had been 138,411 tonnes. Exports account for an overwhelming portion of sales, with local parties receiving volumes of just 4,598 tonnes during 2004 and 2,305 tonnes during the first six months of this year. The figures apply to the company’s main mill in Bahrain’s North Sitra area which manufactures coils, sheets and circles. The company also has a foil mill, which uses product from the main mill and rolls it down to foil gauges. Garmco’s foil mill is the only one of its kind in the GCC region . Current capacity is 20,000 tpy and an expansion is planned to double it.
 Sheets account for most of Garmco’s revenues, followed by coils.
“The global aluminium market was very buoyant in 2004 and remained buoyant during the first half of 2005,” said a company spokesman. “Demand for Garmco’s products far exceeded even this expanded production capacity,” he added.
  “Market prices are at a high part of the cycle and demand continues to exceed supply in the majority of the global markets,” said the spokesman.  He added:  “Major manufacturers are continuously consolidating production facilities and current market rates are expected to continue until 2006. When new production facilities come on stream, particularly in China, market rates will decline.”
There has been a significant increase in sales within the Middle East and Africa region, with sales growing 33 per cent to 41,376 in 2004 compared with the previous year. The second biggest market, the Far East, accounted for 60,148 tonnes in 2004, up 7 per cent. Europe received 22, 868 tonnes, up 6 per cent, while sales to the US dropped 6 per cent to 14,018 tonnes.
The company’s sales are prioritised for the Middle East market, particularly the Gulf states. Contributing to the dramatic sales to the region were roofing and sheeting products that went into Aluminium Bahrain’s (Alba) Potline 5 expansion as well as significant building projects within the Gulf that needed paint sheets or mill finish sheet cladding.  In the Far East, Garmco operates five subsidiaries and in Australia and Singapore it has service centres with fabrication equipment that slits coil and cuts sheet. The company has sales operations in Thailand, Hong Kong and Shanghai.
The latest expansion raises capacity to 160,000 tpy and it followed one completed in March 2004, which raised capacity from 125,000 tpy to 145,000 tpy.
The company is planning for the next expansion, which will utilise the continuous casting process. The project will raise total capacity to 300,000 tpy and the hopes are that the board will next year formally approve the expansion plans and have the commissioning taking place in 2008. Metal Bulletin Research has carried out the market feasibility, while UK Consulting worked on the technology feasibility. The engineering feasibility study is in progress and is being conducted by Siemens-VAI.
Garmco is the biggest customer for Aluminium Bahrain (Alba), the world’s largest modern smelter, purchasing annually 138,000 tonnes of primary metal. Alba’s Potline 5 expansion did not bring Garmco any benefits, as it did not include the kind of products it needed, the spokesman insisted. He added that Garmco had been advised that when Line 6 is carried out, part of the existing facilities to cast rolling slab would be shut down, reducing capacity for Garmco.