French firm keen on RP’s tobacco pulp

A foreign paper manufacturing company, whose main business operations are based in France, has expressed interest in the country’s tobacco pulp to meet its yearly requirement of 1,500 metric tons.

Carlitos Encarnacion, chief of the National Tobacco Administration (NTA), said the foreign company, Schweitzer-Mauduit International Inc. based in Quimperle, France, recently sent its project manager for engineering, Jean Christophe Menu, to Manila to meet with him.

He said Menu was accompanied by Peter Ong, general manager of PDM Philippines Inc., a subsidiary of Schweitzer-Mauduit International.

Encarnacion said the NTA has been producing pulp from tobacco stalks as a key component of its research and development program on the other uses of the tobacco plant.

He revealed that Schweitzer-Mauduit found NTA’s tobacco pulp to be of good quality based on its initial evaluation of samples.

Asked if his agency could supply the company’s yearly requirement of 1,500 metric tons, Encarnacion said the NTA is actually targeting an annual production of 3,000 metric tons.

"We could very well supply (Schweitzer-Mauduit) given that target which I know we can accomplish," he told The STAR.

He expressed optimism that given proper government support, NTA technicians and workers could produce 10 to 20 tons of tobacco pulp a day.

In its company profile, Schweitzer-Mauduit is described as a "diversified producer of premium specialty papers" and the "world’s largest supplier of fine papers (for) the tobacco industry."