State plantation company to get ISO 9002

JAKARTA (JP): State-owned plantation firm PT Perkebunan Nusantara (PTPN) III will be awarded an ISO 9002 certificate for quality management tomorrow for its downstream rubber products, a company executive says.

PTPN III Marketing Director Megananda told reporters yesterday that the certificate would be presented by Underwriter Laboratories Inc. (UL), a United States-based certification agency which has audited, assessed and run a two-year training program at the company's headquarters in Medan, North Sumatra.

Megananda said the certificate would automatically give PTPN III access to quality certificates issued by Raad Voor Accreditatie of the Netherlands and the Council of Canada Accredited Registrar of Canada, both are affiliated with UL.

Last November, PTPN III was awarded an ISO 9002 certificate by the domestic certification agency, Sucofindo Registrar for Quality Assurance.

UL plans to award the ISO 9002 certificate to PTPN III for its rubber glove and rubber thread products. Sucofindo had awarded the company an ISO 9002 certificate for these two products and rubber article products.

Megananda said the ISO certificate would help the company to sell shares publicly in 1998.

"This is part of our preparation in that direction... But it's still too early to talk in detail about the public offering," he said.

PTPN III's exports of downstream rubber products go mainly to Europe and the United States. According to Megananda, the company's rubber gloves are all exported, while 50 percent of its rubber thread products are exported.

Megananda said the company was planning to expand its rubber glove production capacity from five million gloves a month to 10 million gloves next year.

The company manages 52,000 hectares of rubber plantations and produces about 50,000 tons of dry rubber a year. The estates are supported by 18 crumb-rubber, sheet and latex-processing factories which have a total capacity of 15 to 30 tons of dry rubber a day.

The firm manages 85,000 hectares of oil palm plantations which feed 10 processing plants, with a capacity of between 30 and 60 tons of fresh fruit clusters a day. PTPN III also manages 9,000 hectares of cacao plantations. (pwn)