Furniture retailer, Mutara Enterprise ltd, has announced plans to build a new factory that will see all its products domestically produced.

Wycliffe Kamanzi, acting General Manager of Mutara Enterprise said construction of the 40-80 metre plant is expected to commence as soon as they secure a site at the industrial park. Manufacturing operations are expected to commence before the end of 2010.

"We had been allocated a plot outside the industrial park but we were required to have it inside the park. So, we are waiting for a plot in the park before we can commence,” Kamanzi said.

The new plant will supplement the company’s domestic furniture production. Mutara Enterprises has managed to increase the manufacture of home furniture, cutting import volume by 90 percent last year.

But it still heavily relies on imports to satisfy the local market for office furniture.

"We want by the end of this year to have a factory that will manufacture all our products so as to stop the importation,” said Kamanzi.

To date, the company has made a total investment worth Rwf2 billion with an estimated annual turnover of between Rwf1.5 million to Rwf2 million.

The furniture dealer recently opened a Rwf500 million showroom in the city centre in a move to easily avail products to its clients.

In a bid to make it easy for most of the clients to buy products, the company has introduced a higher purchase scheme where buyers can make cash payment of 30 percent for the product and the remaining 70 percent in installments over a period of one year.

Mutara enterprise says that it employs 131 workers and plans to open shops in the southern province in the next six months. The company also plans to open a unit in the Northern Province as well as spreading its wings to Burundi.

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