The National Aluminium Company limited (Nalco) would focus on cost reduction exercise in view of the sluggishness of the metal market at the international level. This was informed by Tapan Kumar Chand on his first day in office as fulltime CMD of the Navratna PSU Nalco on Monday.
Talking to mediapersons here, Chand, who was the Director (Commercial) of the Rashtriya Ispat Nigam limited (RINl), Visakhapatnam, said both domestic and global markets are undergoing a slump and it is a difficult period for metal industries. Makers of metals, be it ferrous and nonferrous, need to focus on volume variance and price variance to augment their realisation, he added.
“New market, expansion of customer base, product diversification and high-end products are some of the initiatives needed to be taken immediately to enable the Nalco to tide over the existing market blizzard,” said Chand, adding, “Our emphasis will be more on production of cost-competitive products, waste reduction and technological and operational cost reduction.”
In his agenda, he has kept the company’s expansion and diversification on top priority, along with existing asset utilisation and cost reduction. He would make all efforts to pave way for Team Nalco to surge upwards and scale greater heights of glory, he said.
later in the afternoon, Chand met Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and discussed with him about the Nalco’s CSR (corporate social responsibility) works in Koraput.
Chand brings along more than three decades of rich experience in the mining and metal sector, including eight years at Board level. A Gold Medalist from Utkal University, he had undergone training in Advanced Management Programme at the International Centre for Promotion of Enterprises (ICPE) in Western Europe and in Queensland University of Technology, Australia.