PHOTO:The SIMA strapping production line at the Pro-Ten plant in Cape Town is a beast of a system spanning some 60 metres

PRO-TEN Strap’s strapping production plant in Cape Town is up and running and the first batches of its Pro-10^™ load-securing strapping have entered the market.

The company’s new SIMA plant, installed towards the end of 2017, is now fully operational, says joint managing director Chandru Wadhwani. The Italian-built line appears to be the machine of choice for the world’s leading packaging strapping manufacturers. Pro-10™ is manufactured from either PET or PP. Up till now different systems were required to run PET or PP, but the new SIMA technology makes it possible to run either material on the same machine, sequentially, which is obviously a bonus for Pro-Ten.

At present the line is running recycled PET, which Pro-Ten sources from associate company Extrupet, operating from the Propet site in Killarney Gardens. It is yet to manufacture the PP variant, which will require the use of virgin material.

The Cape plant is ISO 9001-2008 accredited and as such the quality of the locally manufactured strapping at the very least compares favourably with imported alternatives. South Korean manufacturers have been dominating the global strapping market and very few other manufacturers have been able to compete, but Pro-Ten JMD’s Wadhwani and Vijay Naidu are confident that the Pro-10^™product will be competitive.

The Bidvest company Afcom was previously the SA’s sole manufacturer of both PET and PP strapping, but it exited the PET strap sector some years ago as it could not compete with prices of imports; it remains the largest local producer of PP strap.

Strapping, being supplied on reel, is a relatively easy to trade internationally, and for Pro-Ten the possibility to export is hence realistic too.