GSFC Q3 profit dips by 25 %

State-run fertilisers maker, Gujarat State Fertilizers and Chemicals Limited (GSFC) has registered net profit of Rs 172.35 crore for the third quarter ended December 31, 2011 down by around 25 per cent from Rs 228.62 crore in the corresponding period last year. The company attributed the loss to the wage revision for the unionised employees.

"The loss in the third quarter was mainly due to wage revision as well as provisioning of liabilities resulting therefrom in respect of the unionised employees aggregating to around Rs 50 crore, which is a once in four years event. Our overall operations remained stable during the quarter and we will be able to post good growth by the fiscal end," said Atanu Chakraborty, managing director, GSFC.

 

The company's net sales rose marginally by three per cent to Rs 1,300.02 crore during the quarter as against Rs 1,265.14 crore in the year-ago period. GSFC announced the financial results for third quarter at its board meeting held on January 27, 2012.

For the nine month period (April to December 2011) of the current fiscal, company's net sales rose to Rs 3,771.83 crore, up by about 4 per cent from Rs 3,632.56 crore in the same period last year. Net profit for the period stood at Rs 527.23 crore, marginally down from Rs 544.23 crore in the corresponding period last year.

Chakraborty, while speaking to media in Ahmedabad, informed that the company would expand its Diammonium phosphate (DAP) production capacity at Sikka near Porbandar in Gujarat by 0.4 million tonnes per annum with an estimated cost of Rs 250 crore. The company currently has an installed capacity of 1.1 million tonnes per annum. The expansion is likely to come up in 2014-15, he said.

The company also plans to set up new capacities for methanol, nylon and phosphoric acid production. "At Vadodara, we are setting up a methanol plant with an investment of around Rs 300 crore. The plant with an annual capacity of 160,000 tonnes, is at the advance stage of completion and likely to be commissioned by April, 2012," said Chakraborty.