SUAL's Urals Foil increases output 4% in 2006

Urals Foil, a unit of the SUAL (RTS: SUAL) group, produced 15,589.5 tonnes of product in 2006, 3.9% more than in 2005 and 2.6% more than the target for last year, executive director Sergei Borovik told reporters Monday.

Production in 2005 grew 13.7% to 15,006 tonnes.

The company produced 7,868.6 tonnes of product for export last year, including to CIS countries, which amounted to 50.5% of total output.

Production of thin foil with thickness of 0.02 mm or less amounted to 41.7% of total output, with production of foil thinner than 0.01 mm making up 28.9% of total output. The average thickness of foil in 2006 was 21 microns.

Urals Foil invested 21.7 million rubles in production in 2006, including $408,000 spent on maintaining production processes and $187,700 spent on improving product quality.

Borovik said that in December TUV NORD conducted an inspection audit of the plant's quality management system and made a preliminary recommendation to extend the company's certificate.

Urals Foil, Russia's second largest producer of aluminium foil, has a complete production cycle for foil, from smelting and casting of aluminium strip to final rolling.