Dunes Industries held a VIP ceremony this week to celebrate the opening of its new hot-dip galvanizing plant at SOHAR Freezone. His Excellency Dr Ahmed Mohammed Salem Al Futaisi, Minister of Transport and Communications, was the guest of honour at the event, with a ribbon cutting ceremony to declare the state-of-the-art facility open for business after a 12-month development phase.

Dunes Industries Chairman, H.E. Mohammed bin Hamdan Al Tobi, SOHAR Port and Freezone CEOs Jamal Aziz and Andre Toet, as well as a number of other senior executives from SOHAR and Dunes Industries were on-site on Monday to celebrate the expansion.

Dunes has leased an additional 5 hectares of land, doubling the size of its plant in SOHAR and adding to the existing foundry and manufacturing facilities for fencing and steel shutters. The new facility will primarily manufacture galvanised steel safety guardrails for the many new highways under construction in Oman and the region.

The new facility was largely designed and constructed in Oman by Dunes own group companies, but best-in-class, specialised guardrail manufacturing and galvanizing machinery has been brought in from Italy, Austria and Germany.

The company is already leading the way with its Omanisation targets and it is set to recruit a total of over 60 people from the local area. H.E. Mohammed bin Hamdan Al Tobi, Chairman of Dunes Industries, commented: “We opened our first plant in SOHAR just two years ago and our successful growth shows that the decision to locate here was a good one — we are extremely proud to be doubling the size of our operations here in such a short time.”

The expansion in SOHAR comes in response to greatly increased demand for steel safety guardrails, as road infrastructure in Oman develops apace and road safety is brought up to exacting international standards. The new SOHAR to Riyadh highway will be opening in a few months time and will add to the many new highways around SOHAR that are already open or nearing completion.

Jamal Aziz, CEO of SOHAR Freezone, added: “Dunes Industries’ expansion at SOHAR is testament to their own abilities and to the success of SOHAR; we are proud to contribute to the road construction market which has brought hundreds of kilometres of new, international standard highways to this part of the Arabian Peninsula and each kilometre of new highway requires an average of four kilometres of new steel guardrail.” He concluded: “With a focus on diversifying our economy, Oman is investing heavily in upgrading its road network in order to better serve the country’s industry and trade potential, this means there is huge potential for Dunes Industries in Oman and the broader GCC region.