Document Y1bO8JEp5ExJdOg8zXKnvpR0

CHEMICAL MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION EXECUTIVE BRIEFING Witco Corporation 10:00 am -12:30 pm Friday, September 13,1996 Executive Conference Room CMA Headquarters Office 10:00 a.m. REVIEW WITCO'S BUSINESSES AND PRIORITIES AND CMA STRATEGIC PLAN AND STRUCTURE Gary Cook, Chairman, President and CEO, Witco Corporation Carl Soderlind, Senior Vice President, External Affairs, Witco Corporation Fred Webber, President and CEO, CMA Charles Van Vlack, Executive Vice President and COO, CMA 10:30 a.m. 10:45 11:00 CMA STRATEGIC GOAL NUMBER ONE: EARN THE PUBLIC TRUST Objective A: Deliver on the Responsible Care Commitment Witco's Implementation of Responsible Care Management Systems Verification Opportunities and Benefits Value of Responsible Care: Results of Discussions with the Insurance Industry Board Committee on Responsible Care: Expected Direction Dick Doyle, Vice President, Responsible Care Objective B: Improve Public Perception of the Chemical Industry Status of Public Outreach Efforts Benefits Message Development: How to Communicate the Chemical Industry's Key Role in the Economy and Chemicals Importance to the Quality of Life Jon Holtzman, Vice President, Communications Objective C: Manage Research to Promote Risk, Product Stewardship and Advocacy Board Committee on Health and Environmental Effects Research Jon Holtzman and David Zoll, Vice President and General Counsel CMA STRATEGIC GOAL NUMBER TWO: IMPROVE ADVOCACY IMPACT 11:15 Objective B: Represent CMA Members Interests in Global Forums International Council of Chemical Associations North American Council of Chemical Associations United Nations Environment Program CMA 175344 (continued from preceding page) About 180,000 South 'Afri cans work in the chemicals industry, which accounts for 5 per cent of gross domestic product. The Department of Trade and Industry, which has set up a task force to examine growth prospects for the sector, would like it to contribute about 8 per cent. The task force is develop ing proposals for a number of measures which might benefit the industry, such as , technical innovation, invest- inept in capital equipment and training initiatives. It is also identifying a number of constraints on the industry, -including disincentives to . foreign investment, such as foreign exchange controls and high transport costs, /wlifch make it difficult for f-&>mpanies to compete as exporters outside Africa. Although the task force has set 150,000 new jobs as a target, some ' observers believe constraints'em the , industry's growth make that. ..figure much too optimistic. -: r*My. initial reaction is that il50,000 1 jobs sounds too , high," said Mr Paul Carter, analyst at ING Barings in FINANCIAL Downstream customers believe their ability to create jobs is severely hampered by Sasol's monopoly position, Mr Doug Dejager, chairman of Leneo Holdings, a plastics , packaging company based in Cape Town, said: "When there .were sanctions, a siege economy developed, and peo ple tended to build their infrastructure based on the protection they received from the government. Now they still have a protection ist mentality." He said raw material man ufacturers - namely Sasol and Polifin, a chemicals company formed when Sasol and AECI, the Anglo-Ameri can subsidiary, merged their petrochemicals and plastics interests - were able to charge domestic customers higher prices than those charged to export customers. But transport costs and import tariffs still made it prohibitively expensive for downstream converters to . purchase their raw materials as imports, ' Sasol says global chemical, . producers in Europe and the I rUS nearly all charge their, tlocal customers higher prices than are charged in the export market. In order to compete in markets out side South Africa, Sasol and other commodity suppliers must sell their chemicals at the prices being charged by other global exporters. But in order to make its' margin targets, it must charge higher prices to its domestic customers. "This is a normal eco nomic feature of the interna tional petrochemicals mar ket," said Mr de Toit "If we sold in the local market for . the export parity price, we ' would go bust." It will take some time for downstream converters to adjust. Dr Vince Lovel, exec utive director of Sentrachem, the chemicals man ufacturer, believes it is partly.a matter of scaling back expectations. "We have to limit our aspirations in chemicals and concentrate on those areas where we can compete. This means I can not honestly , say we have a great petrochemical future in this country, but we have a good chemical industry future." TIMES CMA 175345