Companies

China’s Wu Yi to hire 800 locals for Athi River base

wu yi

Wu Yi Plaza in Nairobi. PHOTO | SALATON NJAU | FILE

Chinese conglomerate China Wu Yi is set to employ 800 Kenyans at its Sh10 billion housing materials complex set for completion in March.

Construction of the base, which sits on 29.6 acres in Athi River, commenced in September 2016. It is part of China’s “Belt and Road” policy prioritising infrastructure and industrial projects.

READ: WERE: China’s One Belt initiative could pile up Africa’s debt

The total floor area of the China Wu Yi Kenya Building, Industrialisation Research, Development And Production Base And Construction Material Supermarket is 75,970 square metres.

It will comprise an exhibition area, office block, dormitory, service block, building material supermarket and a hotel.

Good relations

“We intend to employ 800 locals at the base once it’s complete. We settled on establishing it in Kenya owing to the country’s good bilateral relations with China and because it is an economic hub,” said Yihua Lin, the executive deputy general manager at China Wu Yi in Kenya.

The multinational is putting up the plant through its locally incorporated subsidiary China Wu Yi Precast (Kenya) Company Limited.

The company mostly focuses on producing assembly components for multi-storied apartment residential buildings, detached house, standardised project site residential houses and traffic engineering precast components.

The construction material supermarket set to occupy 23,850 metres square, will stock stones, ceramic tiles, bathroom appliances, electrical materials, construction hardware, lamps, and kitchen furniture, among others.

Materials stocked at the supermarket will be sourced from Fujian Province in China.

READ: Chinese shine to global influence and leadership

Housing deficit

Transport secretary James Macharia said the complex would help to partially address the housing deficit facing the country.

Rapid urbanisation has seen a growing housing deficit leading to a backlog of 1.85 million housing units.

“Establishing of the base is significant in meeting the construction requirements and Kenya Vision 2030 which provides for adequate housing and reasonable standards of sanitation,” he said during a tour at the facility.

China Wu Yi has employed 530 local workers to undertake construction works at the base.

In July, the company announced plans to purchase a 20-acre land in Kilifi County at a cost of Sh530 million, signalling its intention to expand its manufacture of construction materials locally.