Landowner firm posted K3.8mil profit for last year

ONE of the country’s most successful landowner companies has posted a K3.8 million dividend for the year ending 2021.
Chairman and founder Peter Heno said the company did not fare so well in 2019 and 2020, because of the Coronavirus (Covid-19).
But the seven-year-old company got back to its feet and hoping that 2022 would be the year to make up for the loss.
“(The company) has a dividend policy where 60 per cent is set aside for investments, 30 per cent goes to our shareholders and 10 per cent goes towards community investments like church projects, schools, sports and charities like Cheshire Home which we’re a part of,” Heno said.
“We do a lot of community projects, a lot of churches have benefited as well and this 10 per cent is equally distributed across all our five major shareholding companies.
“Each director is responsible to nominate their own projects and funds are given to them to deliver to the community they represent.”
Heno said one of the major projects now was the Wafi-Golpu in Morobe.
“While initial capital costs are pegged at US$2.8 billion (about K9.8 billion), the total project could cost as much as US$ 5.3 billion (K20.3 billion) over the 28-year mine life.
“The project is expected to create over 2,500 jobs during the construction phase and 850 during the operation stage.”