Austar comes to Africa with a new subsidiary opened in April of 2012 based in Kenya’s capital Nairobi. The subsidiary trades under the name of Australian Horticultural Chemicals Limited (AHC). Kenya was chosen for the first African office because of the sheer scale of horticultural enterprise amongst commercial and small scale farmers as well as its communication and transport networks. Major crops of interest to Austar in the region are mangos, citrus, avocados and dates.
Since Chemicals Direct has appointed a regional manager for Africa in the first quarter of 2011, agents have been appointed for North Africa (Egypt and Sudan) and West Africa (Senegal, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Nigeria Cameroon, Ivory Coast and Liberia). Work has been done in Africa with Austar on Mangos in Kenya, Ghana, Tanzania and Egypt and on Avocado in Kenya and Tanzania to date. With repeat orders African customers are obviously as delighted with Austar as our customers in Australia and Latin and South America.
The introduction of Austar on the African continent is a major investment for Chemicals Direct but the decision to invest was made easy when the staggering potential of agriculture in Africa was realised in addition to the fantastic opportunities afforded for increased yields and profit for African farmers.