Ethiopia: BGI Ethiopia gets a loan to buy shares of Raya Breweries

Dashen Bank SC has provided a loan of 650 million birr to BGI Ethiopia for the payments the latter will make for the purchase of the shares of Raya Breweries, The Reporter has learnt.

According to sources from Dashen that talked to The Reporter on the condition of anonymity, the Bank has already disbursed the mentioned amount to the client.

However, Asfaw Alemu, president of the Bank, though he did not deny the disbursement of the loan to the said client, said that any disclosure of the matter will erode the confidentiality of the Bank’s relationship with its clients.

BGI Ethiopia, the bottler of St. George and Castel beers in Ethiopia, is among the foreign breweries that invested in Ethiopia. Recently, BGI fully acquired Raya Brewery for 2.5 billion birr in which it holds 42 percent shares in the brewery.

Raya Brewery was established in Maichew, Tigray Regional State, and currently has the capacity to produce 700 hectolitres of beer annually. It was announced on the inauguration of the factory that the construction took 1.7 billion birr. The company’s asset currently stands at 4.45 billion birr.

The inceptors of Raya were 58 individuals including the former chief of staff Tsadkan Gebretensae (Let. Gen.) with an initial capital of two million birr. Then, the number of shareholders grew to 2,440 pushing the capital up to 250 million birr.

In addition to the loan that BGI acquired from Dashen, Awash Bank also expended loan of 750 million birr for the same purpose. In different occasions, Dashen has disbursed near a billion birr for the brewery over the past three years.

Other than Raya brewery, BGI has concluded deals with Unibra, a Belgian company, to acquire Zebidar Brewery, another brewery in the country. Unibra owns 60 percent of the shares in Zebidar while the remaining shares are owned by Zhimar General Industries SC and it has more than 2,000 shareholders under it.

Zebidar has a capacity of producing 350,000 hectolitres of beer per annum.

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