Coca-Cola Opens $8.3M Somalia Plant

July 5, 2004, 11:18 AM EDT

NAIROBI, Kenya -- After a 15-year absence, Coca-Cola Co. returned to Somalia Monday with the opening of a $8.3 million bottling plant.

The new Coca-Cola plant was opened in Somalia's capital of Mogadishu and is owned by United Bottling Co., formed by a consortium of 399 Somali investors, the Atlanta-based company said in a statement from its Nairobi office in neighboring Kenya.

"It has taken six years to build up the necessary goodwill and to raise the capital invested in this project," Abdirisak Isse, United Bottling Co.'s chairman and chief executive officer, said in the statement.

The plant has 130 employees and will operate at 70 percent of its production capacity for the time being, producing three Coca-Cola brands: Coca-Cola, Fanta and Sprite, the statement said.

When at full capacity, the plant can produce 36,000 bottles an hour.

Somalia, which has a population of about 7 million, has not had an effective central government since the 1991 ouster of dictator Mohamed Siad Barre. Much of the country's infrastructure has been destroyed by more than a decade of banditry and clan-based fighting.

The country is controlled by heavily armed militias, and businessmen employ their own gunmen for security.

A 21-month-old peace process intended to end the chaos is supposed to be in its third and final phase, but the negotiations have been dogged by disputes and walkouts by Somali delegates.